


A Major Division of Knowledge

by NamethePigeonRaymond



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: A little Thasmin, Always trying to spin a rom-com version, Chameleon Arch (Doctor Who), Coffee shop meet cute anyone?, F/F, Fluff, Gen, Professors in love, Some Plot, Some angst, Space Heist, Space Wives, human nature au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:41:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 33,734
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23153416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NamethePigeonRaymond/pseuds/NamethePigeonRaymond
Summary: “Professor Song has been leading the Battambang dig. And Doctor Smith here is our foremost expert on paleolinguistics - I’m sure you’ll find her most suited to your use…” He trailed off. “Do you two know each other?”Joan was looking rather flushed as River said smoothly, “Not quite as well as I would like.”// OR //The Doctor is hiding in plain sight as a university lecturer after an intergalactic death squad forces her to activate the Chameleon Arch when she meets the mysterious and alluring Professor River Song who can’t seem to stop flirting with her.
Relationships: The Doctor/River Song, Thirteenth Doctor & Yasmin Khan, Thirteenth Doctor & Yasmin Khan & Graham O'Brien & Ryan Sinclair, Thirteenth Doctor/River Song
Comments: 239
Kudos: 361





	1. Chapter 1

When Joan opened her eyes, she could remember she was dreaming of a place with two suns. They hung low over a red and dusty city. But as she blinked once, twice, the image was gone as if it never existed. Joan usually tried harder to hold on to her dreams because her brain really knows how to cook them - shapeshifting aliens, snogging Queen Elizabeth I, you name it - but this morning she felt exhausted - like she’s been running non-stop in her dreams again.

The musical alarm on her phone sounded and she reached for the offending device on her bedside table. Closing one eye to avoid the bright light of her phone screen, she scrolled through the notifications that came in overnight.

Questions about essay submissions.

Texts from Yaz.

An email about that successful archaeological dig in Battambang.

More student emails.

More texts from Yaz and Ryan in the group chain.

_Yaz: joan where were you last night??  
Ryan: yeah last night was proper awesome  
Yaz: of course you’d say that with those girls fawning over you  
Ryan: don’t be jealous that I’ve got game  
Yaz: gross _

Joan couldn’t help but type a reply.

 _Joan: guys I told you I have a morning class today_  
_Joan: but glad you had fun_  
_Joan: tell me which girls tonight_ *kissy face emoji*

Placing her phone face down back on her table, she lay back on her pillow and huffed her short blonde hair out of her face, closing her eyes once more to will the images from her dreams last night to appear. But they stayed stubbornly away.

Oh well. Tomorrow night then.

She loved entertaining her friends Yaz, Ryan and Graham about the places her sleep takes her to - they were always such adventures, though there is also usually danger, and running. So much running. For as long as she could remember, Joan has had such vivid dreams, and sometimes they were fanciful and nice - like that time she was on the Orient Express, other times they were downright weird - like when she dreamt about cats dressed up as nuns - but then there were times she woke up terrified and aching. Those she didn’t really tell her friends about.

But as always it was a new day and it was time for work.

Joan climbed out of her bed and got about her morning routine to get ready. It was a busy time of the year, what with finals around the corner and research projects lining up for the summer.

By the time Joan closed the dark blue door to her tiny flat in central London, she was dressed in one of her usual plain grey suit jacket and matching black pants - a perfectly sensible outfit for her life as a university faculty member, if not for a little splash of colour with her bright rainbow cloth hairband and her signature silver ear cuffs. The university was just four blocks away from her flat, which explained why Joan put up with the London prices. There is really nowhere she would rather be than teaching Linguistics at the London School of Art, History and Culture. And that’s where she’s been for the past eight years.

How incredible it is to be energised by her daily life even after so much time. Even if it’s small. Perhaps because it is small.

It was with this lovely thought that Joan added a little extra enthusiastic skip in her usual stroll to her neighbourhood coffee shop and she walked right into someone at the door. Who was holding coffee.

“Oh shite!” It was extremely hot coffee. That was now dripping all down her clothes.

The person who crashed into her drew back immediately, light brown-green eyes wide in alarm. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry!” The woman looked in horror at Joan’s now soaked jacket, reaching her hand out to try to help but unsure of what to do. She was slightly taller than Joan, with a head full of mad brown curls, well-worn lines around her eyes, and dark red lipstick.

Joan, too, looked down at herself and sucked in a breath as she pulled the wet fabric away from her skin. At least in the cold English air the coffee was immediately no longer hot.

“I’m so sorry,” the woman repeated, as she thrusted a handful of napkins into Joan’s hands. “Are you ok?”

“I’m all right,” Joan said brightly, not wanting the woman to feel bad about what was clearly an accident. She used the napkins to dap at herself rather futilely. Despite the cold, she peeled her jacket off and surveyed the damage. Well this needs to go to dry cleaning. As well as her white blouse underneath, judging by the huge coffee-coloured stain on the middle of her chest.

When Joan looked up the other woman was staring at her blouse as well, looking apologetic and a hint of - what was it - appreciation? Joan was suddenly very aware of how thin her blouse is.

“I’m not usually this clumsy, I can assure you,” the woman smiled mildly, her voice velvet. As if to demonstrate this, she held Joan’s elbow and deftly maneuvered them away from the coffee shop door where people were still coming and going. They stood by the window where Joan could see Graham in an apron behind the counter, giving her a questioning look. Joan shrugged her shoulder in reply.

“Somehow I believe you,” Joan turned back to the woman with a smile. She was wearing a black leather jacket and a thick brown belt cinched at her waist, a white tank top which fit her very nicely, tight black jeans and sky high boots. How does she walk in those things.

“Can I make it up to you? Pay for your cleaning perhaps?”

“No that’s really quite all right. Don’t worry about it,” Joan waved her hand dismissively. “I live just round the corner so I’ll just pop home for a change.”

"Do you?" The woman said, "Nice area, isn't it?"

Joan tilted her head, proud for some reason. "Yeah, I love it. Was just thinking today about how much I love it. You? From around here?"

"No, just visiting," The woman's lips tipped up politely, and then parted into a large smile before she could help it as if it ran right away from her, the lines around her mouth lovely but not as much as those around her eyes. "But I'm already liking what I see so far." Joan was distantly aware of her heartbeat gaining an impulsive sort of momentum. She did not know what to say next. 

The other woman saved her. “How about I buy you a coffee?”

“Another one?” Joan grinned too, all toothy, no restraint. “I think this one already woke me right up, so I should really thank you for that. Was rather tired this morning from running in my sleep.” Joan wasn’t sure why she was still talking.

But the woman didn’t seem to mind. “Well,” she said, eyes dancing. “Always glad to help. And if you were looking to get better sleep, I know several other ways too.”

Her remark was placed just this side of innocence, but a knowing glint in the eyes caused Joan to look away, feeling almost shy.

“I’m River by the way,” she put out her hand.

Joan closed her palm over hers, which was firm and calloused. “Joan.”

They beamed at each other for a beat longer before releasing their hands.

“I have to go, Joan, but it was nice to meet you.”

“Oh right, well, yeah and I better go back and change. I guess I’ll see you around.”

“Promise?” River said, without needing a response and turning to leave. And it was a good thing she didn’t too, because Joan stood rooted to the spot for a few minutes after River left, smiling to herself and savouring the short-lived encounter. It was still a cold spring in London but Joan felt nothing but warmth.

When she finally entered the coffee shop because she really did need an actual cuppa to drink, Graham practically shouted at her. “Did what I think happened just happened?”

Joan scrunched her face in embarrassment. He was such a grandpa sometimes. “Nothing happened, Graham!” she insisted, cheeks flaming.

But when she came over to the counter where Graham worked and he asked, “So did you get her number?” Joan slapped her forehead and groaned in despair.

“Oh I forgot! What an idiot!”

“Better luck next time, Doc,” Graham chuckled, using his nickname for her fondly. But Joan couldn’t be feeling further from a woman with multiple Doctorate degrees.

—-

Joan finally got to the university after returning home and hastily putting on a new buttoned up blouse and an elbow-padded tweed jacket she could not recall purchasing, which somehow seemed to be the most exciting thing in her class today despite the fascinating material on historical and forensic linguistics.

“New jacket, Doctor Smith?” A particularly outspoken student asked as the class was winding down.

“Yeah, looking smart!” Someone else shouted from the lecture hall. While a boy in the front row said, “I feel like it’s missing something...you should pair it with a bow tie.”

“Don’t be daft,” the first student said.

“Bow ties are cool,” the boy said.

“Are they though?” Joan wrinkled her nose in amusement. “Thank you all for your input into my sartorial choices but this ain’t a fashion class innit?”

Class time came to an end before Joan could show how just unlike a fashion degree Linguistics could be, and she had to run to the next building over where she was most certainly late for a meeting with her department head. It was on that dig in Battambang about which she really should have read the email in her inbox this morning. And she was planning to! She just got distracted.

When she finally reached her department head’s office, the door was already closed and voices could be heard inside. Joan burst in as quickly as she could, breathless.

The head of the School of Arts and Archaeology Professor Lang was a thin, bald man. “Ah, Doctor Smith! Thanks for joining us.”

He gestured to a woman already seated in front of his desk. “I want you to meet-”

The woman from the coffee shop turned around, her curls as wild as before. Joan could have sworn she stopped breathing.

“-Professor River Song.”

“Hi,” Joan said, stunned.

“Oh, hello,” River looked like a cat that absolutely devoured a beautiful, helpless canary.

Professor Lang continued, “Professor Song has been leading the Battambang dig. She is the main reason why the dig has been so successful. And Doctor Smith here is our foremost expert on paleolinguistics - I’m sure you’ll find her most suited to your use…” He trailed off. “Do you two know each other?”

Joan was looking rather flushed as River said smoothly, “Not quite as well as I would like.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow so I haven't written fic in over a decade but I couldn't find this specific prompt so guess I decided to write it! Updates will be regular.


	2. Chapter 2

The little bell on the top of the coffee shop door chimed as Yaz entered. Quickly glancing over the place, she registered Ryan and Graham tucked away in a corner despite only a small number of people sitting around after morning peak hour. Their usual spot. 

“Here you go, Yaz,” Graham passed her a still-warm coffee as she walked up and she happily took the mug in her cold hands without even removing her coat. 

“A’right there Yaz,” Ryan greeted, as Yaz narrowed her eyes at him. 

“You’re looking suspiciously upbeat this morning, especially after last night.” She kept her eyes on him, even as she sipped her coffee. Damn, Graham is getting better at this. Should he become a full-time barista?

“Come on Yaz,” Ryan sunk deeper into his chair, stretching his long legs forward. “It’s been three months - even you deserve to have a little fun.” 

“Yeah, ‘m not saying I don’t, it’s just, we should be careful you know. We shouldn’t be talking to too many strangers.” At this, she swept her practised eyes over the coffee shop, as if said strangers could be listening at any time. 

Ryan protested, “They’re not strangers! They’re friends with me mates back home.” 

Before Yaz could say anything, Graham interjected. “Hey, we’re always careful. It’s the Doc we’re talking about here.” He reached out to gently squeeze Yaz’s arm, while Ryan echoed in his attempts to reassure her, even if simply keeping silent. 

Yaz looked back at Graham, really looked into his concerned eyes for a bit, and blew out a breath she didn’t know she was holding. 

It has been three months since they stopped travelling with the Doctor, three months since Joan Smith came under their protection, three months of taking odd jobs and pretending to lead an ordinary life again, and three months where Yaz has been living on edge, turning every corner and expecting to find - what exactly? Joan captured? The Doctor found? The Doctor disappearing into Joan forever? All of the above? 

They were answering a distress call in the 62nd century when it all started to go wrong. By this time Yaz, Ryan and Graham had thought they’ve seen enough with the Doctor - saved enough worlds, ran from enough megalomaniacs - to know the stakes. But this time the Doctor was afraid. This time it was personal. 

The Time Agency had spun a secret black ops breakaway faction the Intergalactic Security Division and they had been eliminating errant time travellers with their latest intelligence technology. Keeping time safe, they said. From people who jump around different time streams, travellers like the Doctor. They wanted a monopoly on timeline interference. 

And because the Agency could track artron energy, the Doctor could only do one thing: hide. 

It was not like her. She wouldn’t have done this unless she didn’t have a choice, her friends knew. By the time the three of them could come to terms with it, they were entrusted with the care of one Joan Smith, and the Doctor was gone. 

“I just,” Yaz said, “I just miss her, you know. I feel like the Doctor would know what to do.”

“I miss her too,” Ryan said. 

It had been tough, hanging around London. It’s like they’re back to real life but nowhere near home. 

“Well at least Joan’s all right, yeah?” Graham tried to cheer them up. 

Ryan grinned, “She’s a right laugh.” 

And Yaz couldn’t help but smile too, thinking about just a few days ago when Joan was chatting excitedly about one of her dreams. In those times when she was tripping over her own words she sounded almost like the Doctor again. And yet she seemed so...human. Without the weight of the universe on her shoulders, Joan was just like any of them. “Can you believe The Doctor met Shakespeare?” 

“And Robin Hood was a real person!” Ryan piped up. 

“How about when Queen Elizabeth I was a Zygon?” Graham said. 

“Except Joan didn’t know what a Zygon was,” Ryan said, “It’s weird… knowing more than her.” 

“Is it intrusive, you think?” Yaz pondered, “That we’re finding out so much about her life without her realising.” 

It wasn't just the adventures. It was the people too, the memories of friends who recurred and rotated. The ginger and the Roman. Sharing chippies with a blonde chick. They couldn’t always keep track and Joan’s dreams weren’t always clear. But they’ve heard enough to know that they were not the first people to travel with the Doctor. 

“You know the Doctor would never have shared this much with us,” Ryan said, a tad sadly. 

It was then that Graham remembered. “Has she ever mentioned a lady with curly blonde hair before?” 

Yaz frowned, “No, why?”

“I saw her talking to a lady with the most gravity-defying hair earlier. It was like space hair.”

“What were they talking about?”

“Who knows, they were outside the shop, but there was something going on,” Graham grinned, “She was flirting, actually. Very badly.”

“What?” Yaz and Ryan said at the same time before Ryan continued, “We’ve definitely not seen that before.” 

“Yeah but Joan is not the Doc, remember,” Graham said. 

Joan was definitely not the same as the wonderful, impossible alien she’s run away with, and Yaz couldn’t help but wonder: If the TARDIS hadn’t already programmed her friendship with Joan, if she had met Joan under ordinary circumstances - on the streets, outside a café - would Joan have noticed her? 

“I’m sure it’s nothin’,” Yaz said, as she drained her mug of coffee which has since turned cold, “But let’s keep a lookout.”

—-

After more introductions and discussing how Joan was going to lend her expertise to examining some results of the Battambang dig, she and Professor River Song had set a meeting for the next day. Which was why it was entirely justified that when Professor Song showed up at her office door just hours later as she was grading papers, Joan stood up in such surprise that she spilled her tea all over some poor students’ essays. 

“Knock, knock,” River had announced instead of actually knocking, swanning in like she belonged there from day one. The sheer confidence this woman exuded was frankly outrageous. 

“Hello Professor Song,” Joan shot River a sheepish smile before hurrying to pat down her students’ papers. “What are you doing here?” 

“Well, looking for you, of course.” River beamed with that mischievous glint in her eyes, “It seems no beverage is safe around us.” She stepped up to the opposite side of the table and reached for the tissues to help, brushing Joan’s fingers by accident, or no, not by accident. 

Stop it, Joan almost wanted to protest, except for how much she didn’t want her to stop. 

“How can I help you, Professor Song?” She said instead, hastily gathering the tea-soaked tissues - which thankfully River had let go of - and throwing them in the bin. 

“Well for starters you could stop calling me Professor Song. I’m River, as I told you at the coffee shop.” 

“Ok, River,” Joan had to purse her lips to keep from smiling too wide. 

“And I was wondering if you wanted to go get a drink,” River said, her eyes roving over Joan’s new tweed jacket outfit up and down before fixing her with A Look. Frankly outrageous. “Something stronger perhaps, and that ideally stays in the glass.” 

Joan put a hand on her hip, “It’s barely past lunchtime.” 

“It’s 5 o’clock in the universe somewhere. Also, aren’t you British?” River said with ease, “What do you say, Doctor Smith?” 

For the life of her, Joan couldn’t think of a reason why not. So she shuffled her papers and cleared her throat, before saying, “Only if you call me Joan.” 

“Joan,” River repeated, her smile so broad it could light up this side of the galaxy. 

Since River was relatively new in town, Joan introduced her to one of her favourite wine bars that opened out onto the beautifully gated Russell Square Park, with its centrepiece fountain faded yellow from age and pergola vined with beautiful foliage hinting at the change in season. London was beautiful this time of year. Typically the bar was full to the brim to the point of customers standing outside with their glasses, so Joan would sneak a bottle out to lie on the grass. It was still chilly and the bar was far from full this afternoon, but that’s what they’ve done. 

Joan was leaning back on her elbows on a patch of grass as she said, “You know I never used to be a fan of alcohol. Used to think it tasted disgusting. But I seem to have come round to it in recent years.” 

“I have to say I’m glad you changed your mind then.” Sitting up, River was looking down at her appraisingly. “Where are you from originally? Can’t say I haven’t noticed that beautiful accent of yours.” 

“West Yorkshire,” Joan was glad to have the wine to blame for the red tinge on her cheeks, her body humming. But she couldn’t really blame the wine for her next round of rambling. 

“Just your typical Northern lass. Grew up in a small village which I loved, but then moved here for uni and stayed ever since. I miss home of course but nothing quite like paleolinguistics to keep a girl occupied. Also my friends are here! Ryan, Graham and Yaz. My fam, really. They’re brilliant. We live in the same building, you see, so I see them all the time...”

Joan finally stopped, embarrassed to have gone on, so she hid her face in a large gulp of wine.

River seemed to have that uncanny ability of psychiatrists and cops who stay strategically silent so you’ll feel impelled to fill silences. It helped that she seemed thoroughly entertained, and Joan wasn’t even telling River about her fantastical dreams yet. 

“When was the last time you went home then?” River asked, content to keep the focus all on Joan.

“Ahh…” Joan started, “Was it a few years ago now? I don’t remember, really.” She wracked her brain but couldn’t seem to recall. She remembered the tiny village centre, that one pizza place, her favourite Indian restaurant, the backyard in her parents’ home, but when was the last time she saw it?

“Time’s usually a blur for me too. Can’t always remember how much time I spend in places,” River said. 

“Where is home for you then?” Joan smiled, pushing down an odd thought nagging at her. Why couldn’t she remember her last trip home? 

“Oh, a little bit of everywhere. Battambang when I was there for the last few months. It’s way too hot, but we did find some interesting pieces you could help us with, some carvings even I’ve never seen before. Didn’t look like Khmer to me.” 

Ooh. Joan’s eyes sparkled at the prospect of another discovery. But even as the wine swirled her mind, she had a niggling inkling that River was trying to distract her. So she asked, “And where were you before that?”

“Somewhere considerably less hot,” River smiled and leaned in, just slightly. An intoxicating whiff of River’s scent caused Joan to mirror her actions, propping herself higher on her palms. Oh, this woman was trouble, wasn’t she. 

Joan breathed. “What about family?”

They were so close now Joan felt like she had fallen into orbit. She could see the same playful look in River’s eyes, but looking closely she saw the mischief concealed something else. She could feel River on the cusp of yet another cryptic but inviting answer, and with her face inches away, Joan didn’t think she could bring herself to care.

But then River’s gaze shifted down, and as she gave Joan’s tweed jacket a onceover, it was as if something had happened to her. 

Her eyes softened, became imploring. 

“I have a husband.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor doesn't drink but Joan sure does, just like her lookalike Jodie Whittaker. Consecutive day update! Because this story refuses to leave me. Hoping the rest of the chapters will be as frequent. Any references to the Time Agency are entirely my own imagination and divergent from canon.


	3. Chapter 3

“I have a husband.” 

“You have a _what_ now?” Joan leaned back so quickly her head spun, the amount of wine in her system not helping. 

And if it wasn’t for the wine, Joan could have been sure River’s face fell in that moment, vulnerability laid bare. Which was strange, right? Joan didn’t know how else she should have reacted.

But River quickly recovered. “Oh don’t worry our relationship is rather… open. We look very different from the typical husband and wife.”

“But,” Joan paused, scanning River’s face, “But doesn’t he mind?”

“Mind what, darling?”

“What we’re doing.”

“And what exactly is it we’re doing?” 

Joan paused, unsure of what to say. What were they doing? When she walked out of her apartment today, she certainly was not expecting to feel so… windswept. She had only known this woman for a few hours and yet it’s like her whole world has tilted on an axis. Her veins were on fire and she could feel her heart beating steadily from inside her temples - but that could just be the wine. 

“I’m not sure,” Joan said truthfully. 

Dangerous mischief has seeped back into River’s eyes, to which Joan’s were now level. “Well, you tell me Joan, because I’m up for anything.”

Involuntarily, Joan’s eyes flickered quickly down to River’s lips, and then up again. River’s grin grew wider, more ravenous. 

But Joan couldn’t help asking, “Where is he now, then?”

“Who?”

“He. Your husband.” 

“Oh, this generation’s obsession with monogamy!” River sighed dramatically, realising Joan was not about to let her casual mention of a spouse become a throwaway remark. “It’s quite complicated, but no, to your earlier question, he wouldn’t mind. Our paths run in different directions, so I don’t see him as often as I would like. I’m not entirely sure where he would be now, actually. Probably off saving the world somewhere - he’s got a bit of a complex.”

“Oh,” Joan muttered, instantly sad for River. And she was acutely aware of the fact that River has said more about her husband in one go than about herself in their entire conversation. She obviously adores him. 

All of a sudden Joan wanted to know everything about their relationship. “How did you meet?”

“Oh, he’s known me my whole life,” River said wistfully. 

People are twined together with so much history. So much enduring. Joan never knew it before but is it possible to miss something you never had? 

They were taken out of their warm circumference and the rest of the world came into view as River gazed outward for the first time since they settled on the grass, toward the stone water fountain in the middle of the park. A little angel stood at the top of the four-tiered structure. More people were starting to brisk-walk through the park, going home or heading for a drink, and the sun was showing off its last hurrah of the day, basking everything in golden light. 

Joan regarded River carefully - with her curls almost reddish when backlit by sun rays and the lines etched around her eyes as she smiled gently, so full of promise. Joan lived a small life, and up until this moment, she didn’t know that she wanted a bigger slice of the universe.

Then, River looked back at Joan and touched her elbow, the way she did at the coffee shop. 

“Joan, it’s entirely up to you what this-” River gestured between the two of them, “-is beyond the Battambang dig. But just so you know, no one is around to stop me from kissing cute blondes from Yorkshire.” Her tone was teasing, but she decided to be gentle as she moved in to kiss Joan softly on the cheek. 

The tenderness of the action surprised Joan, who felt a sort of fluttering within her, and they remained this way for some time, bent toward each other, until they heard a distant voice. 

“Oi! You’re not supposed to drink in the park!” 

Joan’s head whipped up as River laughed into her shoulder. A burly security guard in a long coat and gloved hands was striding towards them from the bar. Before she could ruminate on her life choices, Joan shoved the two wine glasses into River’s hands, snatched up the almost-empty bottle and pulled the other woman up by the arm. “Come on, then!” 

“What are we doing?” River looked excited.

“Run!” 

—-

The next day Joan and River were scheduled to work on the artifacts found during the Battambang excavation. Remembering what River said earlier about new carvings with an undocumented language, Joan simmered with excitement, like she was on the verge of discovery. Whether that related to ancient languages or to a certain wild-eyed woman, she didn’t care to ascertain. 

Buzzing from the wine, Joan had turned up to dinner with the fam that night feeling incandescent. Yaz had regarded her with raised eyebrows, Ryan with teasing incredulity and Graham with soft chuckling. 

Despite how close she felt to her friends, she kept the encounter with River to herself, a little because she didn’t know what to tell them, and a little because she knew whatever it was would change the moment she spoke about it. But mostly because she wanted to guard this feeling of new beginnings to herself for a while. 

Speaking of new beginnings, this morning as Joan entered a university meeting room transformed into archaeological paradise, she spotted River standing by a large collection of ceramic earthenware, metalworks, animal bones and other knick-knacks all laid out individually on a huge platform, the ancient Angkorian empire’s artifacts proudly on display. The rest of her team were milling about the room, each cataloguing their own section of finds. 

River was wearing a khaki top and pants, completely able to pull off the Lara Croft look, and her impossible hair was tied up in a bun. She looked up when Joan entered, offering her a knowing smirk. “Good morning, Doctor Smith.”

“Good morning, Professor Song.” Joan grinned back. Using their professional names in this setting made it seem like they were sharing a private joke. “How was your evening?”

“Very good indeed,” River drawled, “Always enjoy London. Too bad you weren’t there to enjoy it with me.”

“Oh, you know I had plans with my friends - my fam. Maybe next time you can join-” Joan stopped abruptly, embarrassed at how easily she welcomed River into her life. 

“Well, I’d love that,” River said just as easily, amused but also reassuring. 

Not for the first time that week, Joan had to remember to keep her wits about her. She was a Doctor for god’s sake! She cleared her throat and gestured to the table of ceramics before her. “So tell me more about the dig.”

They fell into step as River took her around the room. “What do you know about the Angkor empire?”

Joan’s eyes lit up. “Oh, lots! The Angkor empire is one of the zeniths of the pre-industrial era - the largest urban centre during the 11th to 13th centuries. In fact, one might argue that its technical mastery of stone masonry reached the height of artistic and architectural sophistication. Humans! What a brilliant species.” 

River laughed, “You sure do know your stuff.” 

“I’ve read so much about it it’s like I’ve been there,” Joan boasted. She did not miss the strange, unreadable look River gave her, but continued, unable to stop once she started one of her famous monologues. “Did you know that the Khmer economy at the time was mainly run by women? They were the best traders about; no one could come to the city and do business without meeting a woman first. How genius is that.”

“Yes, I did know that,” River said, “But I am really enjoying you telling me.” 

“Oh! I shouldn’t go on and on. You’re the expert, please go ahead.” Joan made a big show of pursing her lips together and miming zipping them up. 

Looking thoroughly endeared, River said, “The archaeological community has been investigating the Angkor region for so long we didn’t think there would be much left to find. But a year ago the Cambodian government opened Battambang - a province three hours away from Siem Reap - for an international expedition. We had assumed the civilisation collapsed after the 15th century but we had only been studying the elites before. The amazing thing about the Battambang excavation is that we’re studying the lives of ordinary people. And it looks like they continued living in that area even after the empire fell.”

“Nothing ordinary about people, I reckon.” Joan said sincerely.

The strange look returned to River’s eyes, something Joan couldn’t quite understand. Was it wonderment? Suspicion? No, it was...recognition. 

Joan felt like squirming under her gaze. “What?”

“You just remind me of someone.” River said, longing evident. 

Joan dipped her head to hide the disappointment that must have crept onto her face, thinking about the number of fascinating people River must meet in all her travels, other people her husband isn’t around to stop her from kissing. And she felt the cold loneliness of being a reminder, a mimetic pattern, an echo of a person but not quite the same. 

Wanting to move on, Joan plastered a smile on her face quickly, “Well, let’s get to work shall we? Didn’t you say there were some carvings you didn’t recognise?” 

River took Joan to a corner of the room where pieces of different metalworks were gathered, some that looked like they could be weapons and others that became unidentifiable scraps. River handed Joan some rubber gloves and started putting on a pair herself, “We found possible evidence of a metallurgical furnace which indicated that people in Battambang could be craftsmen producing metal objects for the nearby temples.” 

She picked up a jet black shard which looked like a key, except instead of bittings on a single long edge, the blade had two smooth prongs. River went on, “We’re still doing analysis on what kind of metal this is but I’ve never quite seen anything like this before, and check out those carvings.”

Joan took the object in her hand in awe. There was writing on both its legs, but she didn’t know it. Different lines of varying lengths and intersecting angles were etched in a beautifully complex circular pattern. It was like a magnified view of a spy’s microdot, except without a comprehensible language up-close. 

“This is nothing like Khmer at all.” Joan said, amazed.

“There are different versions of this throughout the metalworks, but this is the most complete one.”

Joan furrowed her brow, her frown line fully on display. “It couldn’t be further from Khmer actually. It looks more like a logogram, whereas Khmer is an analytic language, meaning words have to be placed one in front of another in order for there to have any meaning. It’s usually very linear, with the subject acting on an object with a verb. You get what I mean?” 

When Joan glanced up, River was standing so close to her she could sense her warm breath. Even in the guise of examining the curious artifact, it seemed ridiculously improbable. Joan felt the press of vertigo again, and she grasped wildly for something to say to ground her. “Yes, an analytic language like for example… ‘I fancy linguistics’.”

“Or,” River suggested, smiling, “‘I fancy you’.” 

“Yes,” Joan breathed, cheeks reddening and hating being so transparent. “Yes, that’s a good example. Very clear, very good.” 

River’s smile turned into a full-fledged smirk, clearly enjoying the effect she was having on Joan. “You were saying it’s more like a logogram?”

Joan blinked, not processing the question, before realising River was talking about the artifact again. God, a conversation with this woman was like whiplash. “Oh yes, a logogram - like in Chinese or Japanese - when a character encompasses a word, or even more brilliantly, an entire sentence! The latter is very rare though.” 

She eyed the artifact more closely. With its shiny surface, it looked nothing like an object that has been buried for hundreds of years. In fact, it looked right out of a science fiction movie. “I’ve never seen a language like this before. It’s almost…extra-terrestrial.” 

River looked at her in shock, and Joan quickly hedged, “I know it sounds crazy but-”

“You think this is alien?”

“I am certain this bears no resemblance to any other earthly languages,” Joan sounded troubled. The moment she said it out loud, she somehow knew it was true. “Look at how it circles into itself - there’s no linear progression, no one thing after the other. It’s as if… it’s as if the writing is conveying all things at all times - there is no past, present or future.” 

Once again, that look of suspicion returned to River’s eyes, this time hardening her entire face, and she stepped away from Joan. “Where did you say you studied again?”

Joan felt like she was being cross-examined. “Here - been here since I moved away from home. First department of linguistics in the UK, we’ve got. Most international of them all - most number of languages.” 

River narrowed her eyes, “And any of those languages alien?” 

“Well, no,” Joan said, but unable to back up the certainty she felt in her bones. She must have sounded insane. “Let me keep studying this, Professor Song. I’ll give you a proper answer.” 

River surveyed Joan’s face in detail for a beat, and she must have trusted what she saw because eventually her face broke into a relieved smile - and Joan felt like all the tension was wrung from her body, when River said, “This is going to be fun.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have the utmost respect for archaeologists who I’m sure do a lot more than flirt over earthenware, but alas I am not an expert on their profession including how and where artifacts would be housed and studied. There really is an ongoing excavation in Battambang, Cambodia, so some details are loosely inspired from there. 
> 
> Unfortunately I am also not a linguist so any references to languages here are taken from my Wikipedia research and love of the movie Arrival. 
> 
> Please do forgive any inaccuracies and suspend your belief!


	4. Chapter 4

That night Joan was so exhausted from cataloguing her new alien language into the computer system for analysis that she collapsed on her bed, welcoming sleep like an embrace. The carvings on the Battambang metalworks chased her to slumber, swirling around in her mind and refusing to let go. 

She saw them now in her dreams, one of the most vivid ones for a while, but this time the primary circular pattern was glowing and emanating a blue light. It buzzed like a static neon sign on a computer screen. In the dream, she stared at the symbol intently. 

Yaz’s voice floated into earshot. “What are you looking for, Doctor?”

Joan looked up. Yaz, Ryan and Graham were there, all tense eyes on her. They were in a brightly lit room with white walls stretched all the way to further than her eyes can see. In the middle of the room they crowded around a huge console, full of screens and controls. The circular writing was flashing on a computer screen. Suddenly, Joan - or was it the Doctor - knew what it was. 

“I’m looking for the Goliath base code, Yaz,” the Doctor gestured to the screen with one hand, the other still typing furiously on a keyboard, “And there it is! This is excellent. Very excellent indeed. These time agents should really know better than to keep their hardware here, but this is the sort of thing that happens when you’re an organisation that trusts no one but yourself. And of course, I had a little help from me sonic.” She pat the bulk under her blue coat knowingly. 

Ryan asked, “So you can do it? You can shut these Intergalactic Security twats down?” He looked hopeful, and the Doctor felt a surge of something similarly reckless in her chest. 

She started pacing in front of the controls. “The Intergalactic Security Division has been very sly, using artificial intelligence to spot artron energy all over the universe. Goliath is like a great big scanner! It’s watching galaxies everywhere all at the same time. Can you imagine the computing power it takes?”

“So it’s like Cerebro,” Ryan said, “But for time travellers.”

“Ooh, good reference there Ryan-” At Yaz’s perplexed laugh, the Doctor defended herself, “Hey I am very familiar with the X-men comics, mind you. Had tea with Stan Lee once, good bloke. I think I was even a proper fan when I was a man. One of the times. Not the most recent few times though, can’t remember now. Anyway!”

Ryan grinned, as the Doctor continued, “Think of it this way, instead of Professor X, this system is powered by a supercomputer. And it’s so good that it can predict where time travellers would appear and dispatch agents seconds before the appearance of the traveller. The sheer arrogance of the Time Agency - to police people before they even act.” 

She paused as she bent to examine the base code again, all the lines cutting across and looping around elegantly. It’s… it’s ones and zeroes. “Oh, of course!” How could she not have thought of it sooner? 

“Ooh, these Time Agents are _good_ , but it’s a good thing I’m clever.” She huffed in pleasure, which only doubled with an audience. “Look there - can you see the code is made up of ones and zeroes, but only instead of a- a sequential chain of ones and zeroes, they’re stacked on top of one another, criss-crossing. It’s not just aesthetics, it’s superposition!” 

Her friends gathered closer around the console, enthralled, Graham mostly just confused. But the Doctor was already explaining, enjoying each minute of this technology’s - and her - brilliance. “Computers during your time encode information in a binary numeric system. Any data has to first be translated into a series- a series of ones and zeroes for processing. But a new kind of computer - a quantum computer - uses quantum bits that are able to exist in a state that is both a one and a zero at the same time. This means a quantum computer can process an unbridled amount of data at much - much - higher speeds. This must be how Goliath is powered. And someone at the Time Agency has created this base code… you know it looks a little like Gallifreyan, but it’s- it's not. It just mimics it to compress all of time and space together.”

She paused for breath and for the impressed faces of her companions. Graham blinked. With or without understanding, he forged on. “Well, what are you going to do then, Doc?” 

The Doctor did not have time to answer, because the next thing she and the fam knew, urgent, loud voices sounded from the far door at the end of the room. 

“Doctor! Don’t think you can get away with this.” A familiar voice came through. 

The fam all whipped around in recognition. The Doctor deadpanned, “Dr. Leon Perkins. Should’a known.”

As they considered how to talk away at being discovered breaking into a secure Time Agency facility, a huge bang erupted and they were thrown back by a wall of force so strong everything went dark. 

The dream changed, like a poorly cut movie. Everything hurt. Someone was speaking, as if from very far away. 

“...universe is collapsing, we don’t have much time left…” Who was speaking?

“OK, then I’m looking for an exploding TARDIS…” The voice… it was in her head. It was her. A past her - a him! - but her all the same. 

And then- a different voice, a woman’s: “I’m sorry, my love.” On repeat. 

The next thing the Doctor knew, she was transported with a zap onto a ship. Her ship. She knew it was her ship, even though the interior looked slightly different - like it’s been redecorated somehow. 

River Song was there. She was dressed in a white jacket and her typical intertwining brown belts, but with a gun holstered to her hip. A gun! She was jogging towards the door, where the Doctor had just appeared. 

“Hi honey, I’m home,” the Doctor said, feeling relieved to see her, even as she pretended to be suave. 

River stopped, affronted, and glanced at her watch. “And what sort of time do you call this?”

—-

Joan woke up with a gasp. Two words were ringing in her head: Hello sweetie. Hello sweetie. 

She got up and groaned immediately, head pounding as steadily as a drum. Slowly, she recalled every detail of her dreams. Her friends called her the Doctor. That Battambang carving was a computer code that was supposed to look…what did she say - Gallifreyan? Was this the alien language she was so certain about? 

And River. 

River was there in a spaceship. Her spaceship. With her usual mad head of hair. And she knew her. In that dream what they had between them was not this bold yet tentative flirtation, but something that was more real, more wonderful. Joan could feel it, so sure without understanding why - just like with that carving. 

How could she have imagined these things? Why do they feel so real? Like she had lived them? 

Joan sat in her bed for another few more minutes, savouring the beautiful gifts of her imagination, but feeling an odd, gaping sense of loss, like they were already gone. Letting out a deep breath, she wondered again for the second time in a few days about how she could miss a life she never had, and whether that makes her current life any lesser. 

She knew this at least, she wasn’t going to get any answers sitting alone in her bed. So Joan reached for her phone which already had a few messages from Yaz. _I’m up, come on in_ , she texted.

Just as Joan was finished washing up and padded into her living room, as if conjured by magic, Yaz burst in through the apartment door, spare key in hand. “Well, aren’t you a late riser today?”

Ryan and Graham trailed behind her, in the middle of yet another good-natured argument. They stopped as she met them at her kitchen island. “Doc, you look like hell.” 

Graham had called her Doc in her dream too. She was a Doctor of linguistics yes, but who was the Doctor? Doctor Who? 

Her confused silence must have made her friends worried, and they crowded around her, in a gesture that felt so familiar by now she wondered if they did this more in real life or in her dreams. She smiled, touched by her friends’ unrelenting support. “I’m fine, guys. I’m just a little tired. Had a poor night’s sleep.” 

“Dreams again?” Ryan asked cautiously. 

Graham said, “Come on, let’s chat over food.” And that was when Joan noticed the paper bags full of pastries and- “Are those biscuits! Oh, I love biscuits!” Joan reached into a bag and munched on a ginger snap. 

Yaz beamed, “I’ll go put a pot on.” 

The fam went about her kitchen as if they owned the place, pulling out plates for the food and pouring themselves drinks, while Joan sank into a chair and gathered her legs up, placing her chin on her knees. 

“I dreamt of River,” she said quietly, as everyone sat down. 

“What’s that?” “Who?” 

“River Song. That woman I met outside the coffee shop. She’s a professor of archaeology and I’ve been working with her at the uni.” 

Joan did not miss the look of concern that passed between her friends. Yaz said, “What did you dream about?”

“She was on a ship, my ship. I think she was flying it - that’s the first time I’ve ever dreamt of anyone other than me flying it. And I think I knew her. It’s mental - I just met her, but it feels like I’ve known her all my life…” Joan thought about the day River spilled coffee all over her blouse, her smiles, her confidence, and that same day at the park, where River seemed always on the verge of telling her something but then holding back at the last minute. She felt so goddamn familiar.

Ryan said, “And then what happened?” 

“Nothing much more on River,” Joan admitted, a little sad. “But that dream, that image of her… it felt like…”

“Like what, Doc?” Graham asked.

Joan looked into her friends’ faces lined with worry, almost fearing to say it, but then the words left her reverently. “Like a memory.”

As Yaz, Ryan and Graham gave one another troubled, meaningful looks over the table, Joan continued, “I mean, my dreams have always felt so real. They are so vivid, every detail so clear. But this one of River…it’s like I lived it before, in my past life or something.”

Yaz cleared her throat, “That is weird, Joan. Maybe it’s just like déjà vu? I’ve definitely felt like I’ve dreamt some moments of my life before I experienced them.”

“Yeah!” Ryan joined, “It’s just a weird glitch in the Matrix, eh?”

“I’m sure it’s nothin’, weren’t you very tired from looking at all those bones and ceramics all day? Your brain must be processing all that information,” Graham added. 

The three of them, always on the same side. Joan reckoned it’s a good thing they were on hers. Joan laughed as she let herself be comforted by her friends. “Yeah, maybe.”

But, Joan couldn’t help but think, these dreams, this dream of River, they felt closer to her than her own memories, which were so distant that she could not reach them. Goodness, she couldn’t even remember the last time she went home to Yorkshire. 

And yet, how can it be? How can her dreams be true? If they were, how can she be the Doctor? Who is this Doctor who runs around the universe knocking things over and saving people all at the same time, this magnetic person who knows about quantum computing and how to defeat aliens and calls River honey and inspires her friends? She’s not this person. She’s just a girl who’s into languages, who has a small apartment in little ol’ London, just having a meal with her fam. 

The kettle was whistling, and Graham got up to pour the gang some tea. As he leaned over to pass Joan a mug, he waggled his substantial eyebrows at her. “So, what about this River then, huh? You guys looked cute the other day.” 

“Graham!” Joan complained, a flush creeping up her neck. 

“Ha! Yeah, what about this River?” Ryan guffawed, while Yaz smiled silently into her tea.

Before Joan could say anything, the doorbell rang. “Saved by the bell, then!” Joan got out of her seat happily, practically running to the door. A deliveryman offered a large, flat box and a slip to sign. 

“What is it, Joan?” Yaz called over, as Joan kicked the door close with her foot. “Dunno, there was no return address.” She lay it on the edge of the kitchen island, the box wrapped beautifully with a sheer blue ribbon. Untying the ribbon, Joan lifted the cover and inside lay a dazzling sky blue suit. 

A note sat gently on the jacket. “Oooooh,” Ryan teased. 

_See you at the National Gallery at 7 pm. Wear this. X River._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alas, I am still not an expert on quantum computing, so please take all references with a pinch of salt. Bonus reference to The Big Bang and - for those who read the comics - time agent Leon Perkins!
> 
> Hope everyone is keeping safe and well with self-isolation, and I'm hoping this chapter can provide just a little bit of relief.


	5. Chapter 5

The National Gallery in London stood flanking one end of Trafalgar Square with its impressive central dome and imposing pillars that always reminded Joan of the Pantheon in Rome. That night red and gold flags hung between each pillar announcing a gala celebrating its 196th anniversary - which was oddly specific, but any chance for a party, she guessed. People were arriving in groups, all in fancy dresses and formal suits. 

The Gallery was a 20-minute walk from Joan’s apartment, and she had decided to take the familiar path by foot, which she instantly regretted when the wind destroyed the carefully coiffed curls Yaz had helped her achieve earlier. 

Before, in front of her vanity, Yaz had observed Joan’s face in detail as she took in her palpable nerves. “You really like this River, don’t you?” Yaz asked, meeting Joan’s eyes in the mirror with features deliberately schooled into neutrality. Joan had only smiled, not knowing how to verbalise how she felt, while somehow not wanting to disappoint her friend by assenting. 

“Well, this is done,” Yaz had said while pulling lightly at the ends of Joan’s hair to loosen the curls she had just ironed in. “You look beautiful.” 

“Thank you Yaz,” Joan had grasped Yaz’s right hand in gratitude just as it left her hair. She felt an urgent impulse to reach out in comfort. After a beat, Yaz only said, “Just promise me you’ll be careful. I don’t want to see you get hurt.” 

Joan didn’t want to get hurt either. And though with River it constantly felt like she was about to step off a precipice, for some reason her entire being was just screaming for her to jump, caution be damned. 

So Joan walked up to museum security and offered her name, “Doctor Joan Smith.” 

The well-dressed man looked over his list for a short while before saying, “Come on in Doctor Smith, your partner is already here.” 

_Her partner._ Joan let the label knock about her head a little, pleased. 

She entered an enormous main hall with dark pink walls, a ceiling painted with human figures in battle, in harvest, in love, and corridors that promised other wonders. Conversation swirled around her as she moved through the glamorous crowd, scanning faces and looking for her mysterious archaeologist.

People spilled into the next room and Joan followed as she found herself in a massive ballroom with a bar at the end. River must be there. As she edged her way toward the bar, something caught her attention at the corner of her eye. 

Looking up, she saw a huge carpeted staircase where two sides joined into a central column running down to the middle of the room. And who else but River was descending, wrapped in a shining silver dress that cut into a V at her chest and hugged her hips before flowing down her legs elegantly. A thin blue shawl matching Joan’s suit hung on her arms and her hair was pulled back so her curls were piled on top of her head with tendrils framing her face. River took each step in her heels down slowly, deliberately, clearly revelling in the attention as more heads turned to watch her. She was glowing, like a star.

Joan huffed to herself in mild delight at River’s cinematic entrance, feeling inevitably knocked out of breath by the sight of this outrageous woman, while pleasantly peeved at herself for having the exact reaction River wanted. For some reason, this sense of being reluctantly charmed is beginning to feel awfully familiar.

River saw her amongst the people, locking eyes with Joan as she completed the last few steps and walked through a crowd that parted for her like magic until she was standing right before her. 

“Hello,” Joan’s greeting came out breathier than desired.

“My, my, don’t you look fantastic in blue,” River drawled, leaning in to give Joan a peck on her cheek. She smelled incredible. 

When they drew apart, River spent time admiring Joan from head to toe, making her feel very warm. The blue suit in the box had been improbably fitting, and Joan paired it with a white dress shirt dotted with tiny black hearts. She wore her silver ear cuffs and more frizz than curls in her hair after the wind was done with it. Even though she sported her oak-coloured boots, River towered over her. 

“And you look amazing,” Joan said, smiling openly. “Not that I don’t appreciate the invite and the eye candy-” River cocked an eyebrow in pleasure “-but what are we doing here?”

“I wanted to reward my favourite linguist for working so hard,” River reached out to swing her arm around Joan’s waist and press entirely into her side while Joan swallowed a gasp at the sudden contact of so many surface areas. She was forced to strain her neck and look up at River, as River gestured to the room. “What do you think? Quite a party, isn’t it?”

“You know, if you wanted to ask a girl out, a simple coffee would do,” Joan quipped, as River sashayed them toward the bar. 

“Thought you might enjoy the gallery. It does house some of the most famous artists from all over the world.” 

“I do like a museum,” Joan admitted. 

They reached the bar and River let go of Joan to call for the bartender, leaning lazily over the bar in an unnecessarily luxurious gesture, much to Joan’s exasperation. She rolled her eyes fondly and decided to busy herself with picking food from a waiter walking by with a plate of hors d'oeuvres. Mini sandwiches! 

“Eugh!” Joan scrunched up her face in distaste after trying one of the little canapés. “What is this?” She exclaimed as River rounded back with two drinks in hand. 

“Darling, that’s foie gras,” River said sedately, as if she was used to telling Joan what things were. 

“I can think of far better things to put on a mini-sandwich. Like egg - always fancy a good egg sandwich.” 

“You haven’t been to many of these, have you?” 

“No, can’t say I have,” Joan took a sip of the sparkling wine River passed her. “Have you?”

“Oh yes. Always some interesting folks about.”

“Didn’t realise attending galas was part of an archaeologist’s job scope,” Joan quirked an eyebrow. 

“No,” River levelled a gaze at her, “Let’s call it a hobby.” 

As if to demonstrate just how interesting people could be, a lady in a dazzling silk dress and a maroon sash indicating royalty appeared. She was middle aged, poised and graceful, her regality only slightly undercut by a wicked grin as she approached and said, “River Song, as I live and breathe.” 

“Countess!” River said in surprise, as they went in for air kisses. “Fancy seeing you here.”

“Haven’t seen you since the wedding now,” The Countess still held on closely to River’s body, Joan noticed. “You’re looking very well.”

“Not as well as you,” River laughed easily, a melodic sound. No wonder everyone was besotted.

Sensing her gaze, the Countess turned to Joan. “Now, who’s this lovely creature?” And Joan would not have blushed if not for River saying, “She is, isn’t she. This is Doctor Joan Smith, paleolinguistics expert. Joan, this is Countess Sophie.” 

“Nice to meet you, Countess,” Joan extended a hand, which the Countess ignored as she scooped Joan up into a hug.

Soon, River and the Countess began swapping stories of recent adventures, with River telling the Countess about how she took over the dig at Battambang from someone else after hearing about the strange markings. Joan didn’t know if she should feel disappointed that River did not share these details with her before or grateful that she’s hearing them now. The magnetic duo of the Countess and River seemed to create a gravitational pull as a small crowd formed around them and more people recognised River in equal parts admiration and intimidation. Joan watched on in fascination, thinking absently that in her dreams she was always the centre of attention but in real life she was more than content to observe from the sidelines. 

At some point River took up position beside Joan again, and Joan seized the opportunity to snake an arm around River’s waist, feeling at once like the boldest and most familiar move in the world. If River was surprised, or impressed, she didn’t show it, but she leaned into Joan’s touch. 

The Countess must have noticed them because after a couple more minutes she astutely announced the end of the conversation the way someone is used to dismissing people often. “Come on now, let’s leave these two to enjoy the night. River, come visit me soon, and Joan, it was a pleasure.”

Joan smiled, “Pleasure’s all mine.” And suddenly everyone was gone and they were alone in the packed room again. 

River was beaming down at her and it was dizzying. Joan took in a deep breath, “Wanna go somewhere a little more private?”

River’s smile grew and her eyes gleamed. “Thought you’d never ask.”

Arm in arm, they left the ballroom and crossed corridor after corridor until the throngs of people thinned out. A sign stood in front of one of the long passages indicating that the Sainsbury Wing of the gallery was closed this evening, which they assiduously ignored as they stepped around the post, laughing. Opened a couple of years ago, the wing contained the international section of the typically European-centric National Gallery, but - with River there, eyes lit up, guard down - Joan didn’t think she would be looking at much else tonight. 

They entered a small room off the side of the wing’s entrance - funnily enough it was the Cambodian display - and before Joan knew it, River had her pinned up against the wall right next to a painting. In the dim lighting, River’s eyes were emerald, almost green.

“Your-” Joan started, just as River said, “No more talking.” She bent her head and touched soft lips against hers, and Joan felt her entire body rise to meet River’s. 

Clutching her, Joan deepened the kiss, wanting to disappear into the other woman. As River’s lips moved over hers with practised ease - soft, sweet, persistent, Joan’s mouth parted with a gasp, and all she could think of was more, more, more. She felt incredibly aware of River’s litheness through her dress, and she shifted to press her knee between River’s legs. 

River’s hands came up to cup Joan’s neck and as she started grasping the ends of her blonde bob, Joan moaned into her mouth, pulling River’s face in and wanting to pour herself into her such that nothing was left. As she touched her, she became hungrier and hungrier. She felt driven mad, and she never wanted to stop. 

Yet, too soon, River backed away, and Joan leaned forward in tandem to chase the ghost of River’s lips even though she was already breathless. Sighing happily, Joan dropped her forehead onto River’s shoulder, taking the moment to catch her breath. She couldn’t remember the last time she felt like this - like she was drowning but never feeling thirstier in her life. Kissing. Kissing was fun, did she know this before? 

“You are very good at that,” Joan said, muffled against River, feeling the vibrations of her body as she barked out a laugh. “You are not too bad yourself, Doctor Smith.” 

When Joan lifted her head back up to meet River’s eyes - which had turned a shade darker - she found she could not wipe a stupid smile off her face. The Doctor in her dreams might call River honey, but here she was - Joan Smith - kissing her. 

“What’s going on in that head of yours?” River asked, amused.

“I’m just thinking about how only a few days ago my life was so ordinary - I was just going to work and going home. And then I meet you and now I’m kissing you, archaeologist extraordinaire, gala enthusiast, a lover of countesses.” 

“Who said we were lovers,” River’s mouth quirked up and Joan laughed. And then River echoed what Joan said when they were examining the Battambang finds. “Plus, nothing ordinary about you, I reckon.” 

“Hmm,” Joan hummed, still enjoying the way River’s warm body was pressed onto hers. Then she said quietly, “Tell me something real about yourself, River.” 

River considered her for a beat. “What is it about you that I find myself wanting to do exactly that?” 

Joan smirked. “Just got one of those faces, I guess.”

They settled against the wall together, as River said, “I can tell you about my parents.” Joan nodded, encouraging her. 

“They were brilliant. They loved each other very much, and they loved me, in their own way. Dad didn’t always know what to do with me, of course.” 

Joan chuckled, “Where were they from?”

“Leadworth. A small town in Gloucestershire.”

“Beautiful place to grow up,” Joan remarked, trying to imagine River as a young girl in an English town way too small for her. 

“Yeah,” River agreed, her face so completely open that Joan couldn’t help but want to snog the hell out of it again.

“Wasn’t it too small for you?” 

River kept her gaze on the wall opposite where various watercolours by Cambodian artists hung. “No, I was just trying to make the most of it with my parents. I knew our time together won’t last forever.” 

“Who knew?” Joan couldn’t suppress a grin, “River Song, a sentimental soul.” 

“And that’s it Joan, you’ve uncovered my last secret.” 

Joan smiled, but then she couldn’t stop thinking about her own life. She had to ask. “Did you always know?”

“Know what?”

“That you were going to be more. More than Leadworth. More than England. You’re so much more than this place. And recently I can’t stop thinking: what if I were more too?” Joan said, heart suddenly aching. “I lead a small life, and I’m happy with it - I love it actually - but sometimes, it feels like I’m on a break. And I’m waiting.” 

“Waiting for what?” River asked, eyes full of compassion. 

“Waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

Joan let out a long breath, and it felt like she was releasing a secret she did not know she was holding. River gripped her hand, and Joan could feel all the callouses and scars, so much life led. “I think,” River said, “You can be anything you want to be. You can live as big or small a life as you wish. And you’ll still be one of the most beautiful, brilliant, people I’ve come across.” 

Joan pulled River in with her hand, sealing in a sob that rose up her throat with a kiss. It was a gentle melting, melding against each other, reminding Joan of that day in the park. But she’s never felt more herself than right this moment. 

-

Later, a while after they sat tangled together with their new secrets and shared emotions, River stood up in one smooth motion, offering Joan a hand. Then she reached up the slit of her dress and in between her legs to pull out a strange looking metal device which Joan can only describe as a digging trowel.

“I’m sorry, what?” Joan demanded.

“Right then,” River announced, turning and walking to the corner of the room. “You’ve distracted me long enough, Doctor Smith. It’s time for us to get on with what I came here for.” 

“And what in god’s name is that?” 

River pointed the trowel at a security camera in the corner of the room, which Joan has only just noticed is there. The tool made a high-pitched whirring noise and the red light on the camera stopped blinking. What? 

River turned on her heel and looked back at Joan over her shoulder, mischief returning to her eyes like moth to a goddamn flame. “To steal a painting, of course.” 

“What, why?” Joan followed, as River was already walking up to one of the largest paintings hanging prominently in the middle of the room. It was an evocative abstract piece, full of reds, blacks and pinks. It resembled blood. And human bodies. 

“This painting is by Cambodian artist Sobin. A long time ago, I met her - an incredible talent.” River said, brandishing a knife that appeared out of nowhere. Where did _that_ come from?!

“What?” Joan repeated, dumbfounded, “What else have you got under there - an armoured car?”

“That’s in my other dress, darling.”

Once Joan recovered her ability to properly speak again, she hissed in mortification, “You can’t steal a painting!” 

“Why not?” River asked innocently, a picture of nonchalance, and then she actually started using the knife on the frame with a level of expertise that was highly suspicious. “Galleries are surprisingly under-secured.” 

“That’s not- what? No!” Joan sputtered. 

“Oh Joan, look, the National Gallery did what British museums have always done - taken cultural artifacts from another country as if they have a right to. This particular painting they stole right after the genocide when the country had nothing else. Don’t you think it should be returned to its rightful owner?”

River stood, framed by the painting she was in the middle of stealing, washed in its reds, passionate, angry, alive, and she extended a hand to Joan. “So, are you helping me with this, or what?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 100% fluff of a chapter, but you guys deserve it! It's a little longer than usual but I had so much fun writing them that I didn't want to let go. Also, spot the Miss Congeniality reference! Thank you all for your very kind comments and I hope this little dose of serotonin helps just a bit in these virulent times.


	6. Chapter 6

“River, please don’t,” the Doctor grit her teeth, one hand strained against cuffs, as she took in the sight of River in a white astronaut suit, her neck ringed by a large hard shell missing its helmet, her curls tied up. 

River was sitting in a futuristic-looking chair that looked more like a throne, metal shards cutting across a fluorescent light source. The walls behind her etched out mechanical carvings in silver. She was trapped on the chair with black wires running across her body. 

“Funny thing is,” River breathed, “This means you’ve always known how I was going to die. All the time we’ve been together, you knew I was coming here.”

The Doctor could only look on, overwhelmed, her chest aching. 

“The last time I saw you - the real you, the future you I mean - you turned up on my doorstep with a new haircut and a suit. You took me to Darillium to see the Singing Towers. What a night that was. The towers sang and you cried. You wouldn’t tell me why, but I suppose you knew it was time. My time. Time to come to the Library. You even gave me your screwdriver. That should have been a clue.”

At this, the Doctor reached in desperation toward the floor where a blue book and two metal devices lay, like two very large pens. She willed her whole body to move, knowing she could fix it, if only-

“There’s nothing you can do,” River said. The worst words in the known universe. 

“You can let me do this!” the Doctor shouted, anguished. 

“If you die here, it would mean I never met you,” River’s despair equalled hers. 

“Time can be rewritten.” 

“Not those times, not one line. Don’t you dare.” River’s voice broke, tears shining in her eyes. But she was determined, decided. And in that moment, the Doctor knew River would sacrifice everything for them - for their story.

“It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s not over for you. You’ll see me again, you’ve got all of that to come,” River meant it as a comfort, a salve, “You and me. Time and space. You watch us run.” 

The Doctor didn’t understand, she couldn’t. “River, you know my name.”

A disembodied female voice sounded: _Auto-destruct in 10._

“You whispered my name in my ear.” 

_9, 8, 7._ River put on a black barbed crown, like a queen doing it for the last time. 

“There’s only one reason why I would ever tell anyone my name, there’s only one time I could.” the Doctor said, loss and helplessness engulfing her. 

“Hush now,” River smiled sadly, lifting two ends of the cables around her lap to connect them. _4, 3, 2._

“Spoilers.”

A bright light entered her vision and she knew: River was gone.

—-

Joan was awake, but she did not wish to open her eyes. She lifted the back of her hand to wipe her face which she already knew was wet with tears. Then, she sobbed, curling sideways into her bedspread and grabbing the duvet over herself. 

Loss sat on her chest like a huge pile of stones damming up a stream; she never realised how oppressive and heavy a vast emptiness could feel. Joan dragged her breaths through constricted, grief-drowned lungs, finally opening her eyes though all she could see was her dream version of River connecting those ends of the cords and sacrificing herself - for what she didn’t know. 

Squeezing her eyes shut - and a few tears out - again, she bid the memory to depart. And that was what it felt like - a memory. Or else her mind was playing a sick joke on her. 

Why was River in an astronaut’s suit? What was she doing? Where were they? What was Darillium? Who was the Doctor? It was someone else, but she knew with bone-deep certainty that it was herself. It was getting more and more difficult to ignore the seeming veracity of these dreams. Time can be rewritten, she had said in the dream. Was her time rewritten? 

Not those times, not one line. 

Joan believed somehow that she had been through this sequence of events, that she had already lost River Song. 

You and me, time and space, River had said. It had certainly felt that way at the National Gallery the night before - them on their little adventure, venturing a tad outside the law (“It’s not called stealing when you’re taking it back!”) for something larger than themselves. It even felt awfully similar to when they were running away from security at the park. Or when Joan tripped over her words trying to understand the strange language River put in front of her, on the verge of discovery. 

River seemed more a figment of her vivid imagination than anything else she has encountered in her reality. So, who was she, really? 

Finally calming down from her horrible nightmare, though still feeling a little shaken, Joan picked up her phone from the bedside table and tapped the first number from her recent call list - Yaz’s. As the dial tone sounded, Joan wondered how she could even begin asking Yaz for help. I’m dreaming ceaselessly of a woman I just met as if she was the most important person in my life? Someone from my dreams has finally made an appearance in my real life? She felt insane. 

But Yaz did not pick up. Joan’s sense of loss was abiding. 

In a haze, Joan rose from her bed and found the spare key she had of Yaz’s apartment. Still dressed in her pajamas, she walked out from her place to a few doors down the corridor and knocked when she reached her friend’s. No answer. 

But Joan knew Yaz would be fine with her entering her apartment, so she turned her key in the lock and called, “Yaz!” 

The small shoebox apartment was empty. Joan ambled in and sank into her friend’s couch. Strange. Where would Yaz be so early in the morning? She thought about what Yaz would say. “Don’t be silly, you’re just dreaming of her because you like her so much.” Or “You dream of us too! And we’re regular people, ain’t we.” 

Maybe she was really going mad, but in imagining Yaz speaking to her, Joan heard a voice. She eyed the room and concentrated on the sound. Whispers. They were coming from Yaz’s bedroom. 

“Yaz?” Joan got up and approached the bedroom. It was empty, no Yaz. But more murmurs. She definitely heard them now. They were coming from Yaz’s bedside table. 

“Doctor…” A whisper.

Fear struck Joan as she opened the top drawer of the table, shaking. The drawer only contained one thing - a wrist watch with thin brown leather straps and a circular watch face. Looking more closely, she could see some round symbols adorning the watch face. They reminded her of the Battambang carving. What did the Doctor say in her dream? It was a base code that looked like Gallifreyan. Was that what these cosmic-looking round symbols were - the Gallifreyan language? A language Joan did not speak. 

She picked the watch up, as the whispers grew louder. They emanated from the watch, calling out to her. “Doctor…break the watch.” 

“No.” Joan’s heart pounded wildly and she trembled as she examined the watch in her hand. It was beautiful and she had a great urge to smash it. No. This could not be. 

“Doctor,” the watch repeated. 

The terror climbed up her throat until she could no longer bear it. “I’m not the Doctor!” Joan yelled, to the watch, to no one. Then she returned the watch to the drawer, slammed it shut, and fled. 

—-

Five missed calls from Joan were logged on Yaz’s phone as it rang each time silently in a pocket, unnoticed by its owner, who was walking up with Ryan and Graham to a corner of Hampstead Heath in North London. 

“Are we sure it was this way?” Graham stopped in his tracks, bending over his knees and panting. 

Ryan paused by him, a hand on his shoulder. “Yeah, Gramps. Come on.” 

The heath became increasingly unkempt and free as they trekked, losing joggers and dogs on leashes the further they went. It reminded Yaz a little of Sheffield, a sort of homesickness twisting her heart. She turned behind to regard her fellow companions. “Oi, no time to waste, lads.” 

Soon, they reached a familiar clearing masked by trees and winding vines. It was empty, but an unmistakable energy was fizzing. 

“Is it here? Did we get here?” Ryan came up behind Yaz and looked around. “Where is it?” 

“Dunno,” Yaz said, “I could have sworn this was where we landed.” 

Graham came next, bewildered. “Did it leave then?” 

“The TARDIS won’t leave without the Doctor,” Yaz said firmly. Something buzzed in the air. “D’you guys feel that? It’s like this… electricity.” 

She stepped out into the clearing and despite not knowing what she was doing, she tentatively reached her hand out, coming into contact with some sort of magnetic field. Inexplicably, the TARDIS appeared, revealing itself - herself - to friends. Yaz grinned, turning to Ryan and Graham, a collective sense of relief flooding them. Somehow, the presence of a time and space machine has injected more normality into these times than coffee shops and urban living.

“Come on, then,” Yaz beckoned, as they approached the police box.

Before Graham could retrieve the key which the Doctor had entrusted with him, the door to the ship creaked open. Yaz felt the welcome warm her, as the three of them clambered in. Just like old times. The interior of the TARDIS remained the same, with large crystals towering over the console, washing the whole place in yellow. It looked strangely empty without the Doctor bobbing about, pressing levers and turning dials which they couldn’t understand. 

Except before she transformed with the Chameleon Arch, the Doctor had quickly taught Yaz, Ryan and Graham how to read the TARDIS’ scanner. This was where they headed now, to the screen on one side of the console. Ryan input the words - the name that has occupied their minds for days: River Song. 

It was one thing for Joan to dream of Yaz, Ryan and Graham and unknown adventures, but when Joan had seen coffee shop crush River in her dreams, alarm bells rang for all three of them. And River was piloting the TARDIS? Who was she to the Doctor? Was she friend or foe? 

The TARDIS hummed and text appeared on the screen. It said:

_Melody Pond  
Daughter_

“What does that mean?” Ryan furrowed his brows in confusion. 

“Whose daughter?” Graham asked, equally confused. 

“That can’t be it,” Yaz tapped the screen. “Isn’t there anything else?” 

As if in response, an alert suddenly sounded throughout the ship. The screen changed, and a scanner reading appeared. Ryan leaned in, “It says it’s detecting the presence of… artron energy.”

Yaz moved closer to read the screen. “That’s the energy that appears whenever someone time travels, isn’t it.” 

“Could that be from this woman - River Song?” Ryan asked. 

“That can’t be right,” Graham shook his head, “This says the artron energy has just been logged a few minutes ago, and River Song first met Joan a week ago now.” 

Yaz whipped up in alarm at the implication, panic seizing her. 

“Joan’s in danger. We have to go.” 

—-

Gallifreyan. Quantum computing. Base code. Goliath. Battambang. Sobin. The Doctor. River Song. Joan’s Google search history was beginning to look like the script of a film, one she did not understand. After finding that watch in Yaz’s apartment, she was not sure she wanted to. 

Discovering no answers or help at home, Joan returned to her office to examine the Battambang carving on her computer again. She had logged all the carvings into an online software that helped process old, or in this case new, languages. 

The Doctor in Joan’s dreams had mentioned that the symbol compressed all of time and space together. Human languages can only perform a poor approximation of this complicated, strange, tremendous reality, and humanity has had to contend with a limited grasp of the world. What kind of species could master time and space in such a powerful manner that they can encompass it all - break it up, traverse it, disregard its rules - to be able to contain it so completely and beautifully in its language? 

“Has anyone told you how cute you look when you concentrate?”

When Joan looked up, River was perched on the outer edge of her table. She didn’t even hear her come in. 

“You have a little frown line right there,” River leaned in to trace the line on her forehead. Joan plastered a smile on, still haunted by the loss of River in her dreams. 

“When did you come in?” 

“Oh, only just.” And then River rolled Joan’s chair toward her, pulled Joan to her feet and kissed her without hesitation. 

Sitting at the corner of the table, River was even taller than usual so Joan had to crane her neck to kiss her back. She was standing between River’s legs and she wound her hands around her tightly before running them through River’s hair, which earned her a satisfying little moan. 

Affection and arousal surged and swirled within Joan, the relief at touching River after grieving her loss so overwhelming that Joan felt she might die. 

River nipped and sucked at her lower lip, urging Joan’s mouth open and sweeping her tongue in skillfully. Oh, it all felt so good. But...but- 

Joan broke away reluctantly and said, “River, wait.” 

Joan didn’t think River had ever waited for anything in her life, because she responded by moving in to kiss down the column of Joan's neck. Goodness, why is she like this. Joan dropped her head back in pleasure and arched her body involuntarily against River who held her firmly in place. 

“River, I need to talk to you.” Joan’s said unsteadily, her legs about to give way. 

“Hmm,” River responded, all lips, teeth and tongue refusing to leave Joan’s neck alone. 

“Don’t distract me,” Joan tried again to sound firm, but it only came out weak. Eventually, she put her hands on River’s shoulders and separated them. River looked mussed and...used. God, it was sexy. Joan deserved a bloody medal for resisting this. 

“But you’re so distracting,” River said, half a whine, half a teasing challenge. 

Speak for yourself, eh? Joan gave her an exasperated look. “I need to talk to you,” she repeated. 

“What did I do this time?” River asked, mischief in her voice. 

“Nothing,” Joan said, placing her hands on River’s hips. “I just… need to understand.” 

“Understand what?” 

Joan examined River’s face, glorious in all her openness and fondness. She almost regretted what she was about to ask next, knowing it could disrupt their delicate balance. “Who are you, River, really?” 

She could almost see the wall build back up behind River’s eyes, brick by brick. But she continued. “Why did you take on Battambang? You knew something was strange about it, and I think you know more about the carving than you’re letting on. What is it about?”

Then Joan couldn’t seem to stop. “And when did you meet that Cambodian artist because I checked and she died eight years ago and before that spent most of her time under house arrest.”

River drew back, her face almost inscrutable now. Something sharp remained in her eyes, but there was no edge in her voice. “You’ve sure done your research.” 

“I’d typically like to know who I’m kissing,” Joan quipped, eyebrows raised. 

“Can’t get anything past you, can I?” River maintained the teasing tone, but it’s clear something has changed between them - or was about to. Joan felt once again on the cusp of something. She waited, as River found the words. 

River finally answered, “I received a message from someone about the Battambang dig.”

“A message? From who?”

“Someone important.” River said, and it was clear from the resolve in her eyes that it was all she wanted to say. 

“And what was it about?” 

River paused, regarding Joan carefully, before she decided to continue, “You were right, Joan. The carving is alien.”

Joan blinked, more stunned at how easily River admitted to this than anything. She removed her hands from River and took a step back. Her heart was a flightless bird trying to leave her chest. “How- how do you know?” 

River jumped off the table but continued to lean on it. “I scanned it. It’s definitely not from earth. And I definitely didn’t see it in Battambang in the 15th Century. I just haven’t been able to figure out what it says yet.”

Joan absorbed this information for a few breaths as she looked around her office, while River watched her. How quietly one’s reality could change in one instant. Joan swiveled her computer screen around and brought the picture of the Battambang carving up again - the circular symbol with its intertwining lines, the ones and zeroes. Heart in her throat, Joan asked, “What is Gallifreyan?”

“What did you just say?” River narrowed her eyes at Joan and stepped toward her, all suspicion and caution again, tight as an elastic band. “How do you know that word?”

“It’s an alien language innit. Gallifreyan. I think- I think this symbol is supposed to mimic it, to operate something.” 

“How do you know this?” River repeated, biting out each word. The River of before - unguarded, sated, loved - vanished. 

Joan put her hands out in front of her body, wanting to reassure River, protect herself, though she had no answers. “It’s going to sound crazy, but I dreamt it, honest.” 

“Dreamt it?” River asked, at the same time she pulled out a little screen from her pockets. It looked like a really expensive game console. She pushed a few buttons and pointed it at Joan, who scrunched her face in bewilderment as the device made a beeping noise. River examined the screen for a few moments. “It says you’re human,” she announced, almost disappointed. 

“Well, of course!” Joan almost yelled, completely perplexed. “You’ve got to explain it to me, River - what is Gallifreyan? Wait, what did you mean before when you said you didn’t see the symbol in the 15th Century?”

River did not get the chance to explain because in the next moment Yaz, Ryan and Graham burst into her office, panting. Yaz said, “We need to leave, now!” 

“What’s happening?” Joan asked, baffled at this turn of events. 

All of a sudden, a shot was fired at them from the window. “Watch out!” Joan heard someone say, and then felt River crash into her, tackling her on to the ground. A green burst of light narrowly missed Joan’s hair and hit a corner of her bookshelf instead. 

The assailant appeared in the doorway, but obstructed by her table with River still holding onto her, all Joan could hear was: 

“Doctor, here you are.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Much. Action. A mammoth of a chapter, but we are all starting to get some answers. Sorry this came a little later than usual - I have just moved home for a bit from the city I'm usually based to be with family in these times. Please continue to stay strong. We can get through this together! Leave a comment below to let me know what you think. <3


	7. Chapter 7

“Doctor, here you are.” The male voice said smugly, but Joan could not see who it belonged to, obscured behind her office table. Was he talking to her? Did he just shoot at her?!

Joan shifted around to look up at River, who still had her arms loosely wrapped around her. River looked similarly confused, but just below the surface lay an undercurrent of energy - like she had woken up expecting to be shot at, and the universe was finally delivering. Joan, on the other hand, had no idea what she had walked into - or rather, what walked into her office. 

From a corner of the room, someone responded, “Agent Perkins.” It was Yaz. Oh, thank god she was safe. 

“Hand over the base code and it’ll all be fine,” Agent Perkins said. His voice was so familiar. Where had Joan heard it before?

Graham spoke next, indignant. “Oi, didn’t we save you from a time loop? Stop pointing ya gun at us.” What was Graham talking about? Her friends all knew what was going on. Was anyone telling her the truth? 

Buoyed by a sudden burst of fury and incredulity, Joan extricated herself from River and shot to her feet, taking in the scene before her. The man - Agent Perkins - was standing in the middle of the room now. He had jet black hair streaked with grey and a stubble, and he looked worn, like he had been through a lot. He was dressed in a white space suit, not unlike the one worn by River when she was sacrificing herself in Joan’s dreams. Yaz was crouched behind the door while Graham and Ryan were standing up in front of the bookcase. 

“Doctor,” Agent Perkins greeted Joan, “I’m not going to shoot you.” Though his futuristic gun was still trained on her.

Despite this, Joan was too angry to be afraid. “What do you call this?” She demanded, turning to point at the splintered wood and singed books at the corner of her bookshelf. “My Latin corner! It might be a dead language but you never know when it might come in handy.” Her quiet London life was being swallowed whole. 

“A warning shot,” Perkins said evenly, “Return the base code to me now.” 

“I have no idea what you’re on about,” Joan said frankly, though she had a small inkling he was referring to the Battambang carving. 

Perkins took a step closer, narrowing his eyes at Joan, whose anger was starting to dissipate to reveal a thinly veiled layer of panic. She was keenly aware of how she had not corrected Perkins - that she had not acknowledged she was not in fact the Doctor. The reasons why she hadn’t, she wasn’t as clear. 

“Don’t test my patience, Doctor. I know you stole the base code from us and sent it back in time. You might have thought you got away with it too, but Goliath came back online at this time and location and who else but you should I find here.” 

Joan considered this information, her mind racing as she recalled the tapestry of her extraordinary dreams and reality. Goliath was the time travel scanner used by the Intergalactic Security Division. The Doctor had found its base code, which somehow turned up in Cambodia in the 15th Century, and was subsequently dug up by River Song’s team and uploaded online by none other than…her. Well, there you go. 

In her silence, Ryan spoke, moving to stand in between Joan and Agent Perkins. “Mate, we have no idea where the base code is, honest.”

“If that’s how you want to play it,” Perkins muttered, and then moved so quickly that before Joan could understand what was happening he grabbed Yaz from behind the door, circling his arm around her shoulders in a vice grip. 

“Doctor!” Yaz cried out in alarm. Joan’s stomach plummeted; she had no anger left, only fear. There was no Doctor here, only Joan. 

Agent Perkins said, “I meant what I said - I’m not going to shoot. But there’s no telling where I can bring her with my vortex manipulator.” He tapped a large leather pouch wrapped around his wrist with the butt of his gun. “When and where can I leave Yasmin Khan?” 

Yaz’s eyes were locked on to Joan’s, pleading. What would the Doctor do in this situation? Joan did not know. After all, she was just a linguistics professor trying to understand people. The Doctor’s life had caught up with her, but she could not keep up. The pieces of the truth Joan thought she possessed sat at the tip of her tongue, and she was about to speak - say anything - hoping her sense of surrender was enough to secure Yaz’s safety, when she heard tutting coming from behind her.

River was the one making the tutting sound of disapproval. Everyone in the room turned to face her, as she leaned serenely against Joan’s office window which had cracked from the gunshot. She had not spoken for so long that Joan could almost convince herself River had nothing to do with all this, but her relaxed demeanour relinquished all of Joan’s doubt. 

“Aren’t you a tedious one,” River gave Agent Perkins a look of absolute disdain.

“Who the hell are you,” he said.

“Who am I?” River said, cocking her head as if she was really considering the question for a moment. She stalked towards Agent Perkins, all ice - though Joan spotted a little fire in her eyes - as he instinctively retreated into a wall, Yaz in tow. 

“I’m Professor River Song. I’m the Doctor’s wife.” 

Then, River pointed her metal digging trowel - the same one Joan saw at the gallery - at Perkins’ gun. The trowel made a whirring noise before the gun sputtered and powered down. 

“Wha-?” He looked in bewilderment at his gun, and River took the opportunity to reach in and place one finger right in the middle of his throat. Perkins immediately sagged like a rag doll, dropping his gun and loosening his hold over Yaz, who scrambled away but kept her widened eyes on River. 

“How’re you doin’ that?” Yaz asked in awe. 

“Learnt a trick or two from the Venusian Martial Arts Academy on one of my honeymoons,” River replied smoothly, giving Yaz a wink. “Nifty move, isn’t it?” 

“Sorry,” Ryan said, “Did you say you were the Doctor’s wife?” 

Joan’s heart was beating a mile a minute. The Doctor’s wife. Her mouth was dry, and even through all of the panic and unease of finding herself in this strange situation, Joan felt an impulsive, unwarranted shot of hope course through her. 

Keeping her finger on Agent Perkins, River turned to Joan with a delighted smirk. “Hello, sweetie.” 

“I-um...Hello,” Joan said, rather inadequately. She felt the least like the Doctor in this very moment. 

River dragged her eyes back to her opponent before Joan could say anything further. “Will you behave if I release you?” 

Agent Perkins nodded almost imperceptibly with his movement limited by the Venusian hold, his eyes hard from the humiliation. With Yaz and everyone else a safe distance behind her, River backed away, removing her finger from his throat. 

Perkins gasped, trying to take in as much air as possible. Before anything else could happen, he quickly tapped on his vortex manipulator and disappeared. 

River blinked at the space where Perkins had been, and grumbled, “What a cheap move. Time agents…” She glanced around at everyone. “He will likely come back with reinforcements.” 

Once the immediate threat vanished, Joan could suddenly feel her legs shaking as she descended into her office chair. 

What did this all mean? The Doctor was real, and it was meant to be her. There were aliens. People can travel in space and time. River Song - beautiful, warm, enigmatic, challenging River Song standing right there in front of her - was the Doctor’s wife. But how could she be the Doctor if she was Joan? 

River seemed to sense Joan’s thoughts because she came up to her, placing her hands over hers kindly. Green-brown eyes bored into her own, but Joan knew River was searching for the Doctor. She could not help but feel herself disappear right before everyone. 

River said, “Now, tell me what happened to my wife.” 

—-

They were sitting in Joan’s living room, crowding over a pot of tea and some biscuits, Yaz, Ryan and Graham on the couch, River perched on the armchair, and Joan pacing up and down her carpet into nothing. If only this was any other day, any other life… Joan could almost enjoy it: having her fam meet her River. But her own life had never seemed further away.

“So you’re saying… I’m the Doctor.” Joan said, stopping in front of her friends and raising her eyebrows. 

They nodded. 

“I’m an alien,” She said. 

They nodded again. 

“Who travels across time and space.”

“Yeah,” Yaz said, “You bring us to the most incredible places.” 

“I mean, some of them are dangerous,” Graham chimed in, to which Yaz and Ryan responded with noises of protests and incredulous looks. “It’s true! Well, not always, but a lot of times yeah. But the important thing is you always leave them in a better shape than they were in.” 

“You save lives, loads of lives,” Ryan agreed whole-heartedly. 

Her friends were looking at her in earnestness, in concern. All cards laid on the table, all truth, finally, but this particular deck pressed on her like a weight. Joan could not help but feel disappointed in herself for not being on board, for still having doubts, for not telling her friends what they so clearly wanted to hear. 

Aching, Joan turned to River, the Doctor’s wife, who had been silently listening to the fam’s story of the Doctor’s latest encounter with the Time Agency’s shadow division, the discovery of the artificial intelligence Goliath that enabled Dr Leon Perkins and his team of time agents to chase down rogue time travellers, how the Doctor had dismantled the technology and strewn it across time, and how she had tried to evade time agents by refashioning herself human with the Chameleon Arch. 

River met Joan’s gaze, her eyes soft and full of love. Years and years of love she did not deserve. It was too much for Joan to bear, so she tore her eyes away, running her hands through her hair. 

“But why can’t I remember all of this? And why did the scan say I was human?” Joan asked.

“Because of this,” Yaz said, pulling out a woman’s watch from her pocket. It was the same watch Joan found in Yaz’s bedside drawer. “You called it a biodata module. It changes who you are, and it contains your memories.”

Joan choked back a gasp. Seeing the watch again made her realise she had known ever since she first saw it that the Doctor was real. She just didn’t think that meant Joan was not. 

“But I remember my life. My parents. I grew up in a little village in Yorkshire. I know who I am.” Her voice broke on the last word, a wave of grief crashing down on her. 

River got up from where she was sitting to place her arms around Joan’s shoulders, and it was then that Joan realised she was shaking. 

Joan regarded River, who was warm next to her, more tender than she’s ever seen. “Did you know?”

“No, my love,” River said gently. “I didn’t know until today.” 

“But you suspected?” 

River blew out a breath. “I did suspect a few times - you felt so familiar.” 

“Is that why you asked me out?” Joan implored, fearing the answer. 

River shook her head, smiling, her eyes crinkling. “I asked you out because I like you, Joan.” 

Joan knew she sounded like a teenaged schoolgirl, but she couldn’t help to say, “You do?”

“Yes.” The way River drew out that word in honey, like it was the most important word in the world, helped to melt the distress that took root in Joan’s stomach. Joy bloomed instead, as Joan smiled reverently at River, thinking that if a fake life could feel like this, maybe she never wanted anything to be real ever again. 

After a few beats, Ryan cleared his throat, and Joan had to purse her lips to stop herself from smiling anymore, turning away from River to face her friends, all wide-eyed at their display. 

“Wait,” Yaz said suddenly, “If you are the Doctor’s wife, how come you couldn’t recognise her?” 

River eyed Joan up and down, similarly to how she did at the gala. “Well, I hadn’t met her yet. In fact, the last time I saw the Doctor, he was a man.” 

It dawned on Joan. “Your husband.”

“Yes,” River affirmed, her words as smooth and reassuring as before. It was herself all along - the Doctor, River’s husband, the person who called River honey. It was always her. It was what Joan has been waiting for all this time, even though she didn’t know it. 

“Blimey, it’s true that you used to be a man, then, Doc?” Graham asked in wonderment. 

“Did you not believe her?” Yaz interjected. 

“I didn’t know what I believed,” Graham said, as the hilarity of the situation suddenly caught on for Joan. 

Joan started laughing just then, and found she could not stop. She was an alien, for god’s sake! Who changed genders. Who ran around the world in a spaceship. All those adventures, all those years, coming in through her dreams, her mind trying to tell her who she was. The Doctor fought intergalactic foes, and here she was trying to ascertain if someone she bumped into at a coffee shop liked her back. She collapsed into the armchair River vacated, guffawing. 

“Are-are you okay?” Graham asked warily, as Ryan said, “I think we broke Joan.” 

Yaz’s brow pinched in concern, as she reached over to Joan, whose laughter died down to a chuckle. “I think Joan needs some time.” 

River also approached Joan, kneeling by the chair to take her hand, which caused Yaz to draw back quietly. 

Ryan took the opportunity to direct another question at River. “What I don’t get is how did you know to come here?”

It was River’s turn to pull something out of her pocket. She put a piece of paper in front of Joan, who took it curiously. It said: _Here’s a mystery for you sweetie. Look into the excavation of Battambang in 2020._

“This is in my handwriting!” Joan exclaimed, mystified. “And that’s stationery from the London School of Art, History and Culture.” She passed the paper to her friends for them to survey. 

River nodded, “That’s how I knew to come here.”

“But I never wrote this,” Joan scrunched her face in confusion, to River’s amusement. 

“Not yet, sweetie,” River said, her eyes dancing. 

The prospect of continuing to have River in her life was a balm. But despite this Joan felt a heavy inevitability coming for her, as fixed as humans’ time. Every step she made ahead of another was just like an analytic language - one word in front of the other - such that everything she has been as Joan was only leading up to this moment for her to become the Doctor again. She was not Gallifreyan after all; she was only human. 

It had been a while since anyone had spoken. Joan looked at her friends, at River. “You really need the Doctor back, don’t you?”

They were silent, and Yaz said, “We do need you, Doctor. I need you.” 

Joan asked, so softly it was almost a whisper. “What do I need to do now?”

Yaz offered her the watch. She said, not unkindly, “You need to break this.” 

Joan took the watch, gripping Yaz’s hand tightly in the process, feeling like it’s a goodbye. The whispers from the watch started up again with the contact, encouraging her to smash it. She could feel her heart pounding in her ears, grief settling into her like a visitor deciding to stay for good. 

“I will die, won’t I?” 

They were all sorrowful, sympathetic. They, too, did not want to lose Joan. But only River was brave enough to answer, “Yes. I'm so sorry, Joan.”

A reckless swell of love for River seized Joan and she grabbed her soon-to-be wife and kissed her like it was the last time she could. Joan buried herself into River for a long moment, before pulling away before she could regret it. 

Then, she threw the watch on to the ground.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew - that was a monster of a chapter. So many questions, so many answers, and so many emotions. I didn't want to say goodbye to Joan either - I will definitely miss her.


	8. Chapter 8

The watch hit the living room floor with a loud sizzling crack and Yaz watched in half-hope, half-dread as swirls of golden energy rose through the gap in the glass, surrounding, caressing, smothering Joan, and then disappearing all at once into her. 

Joan gasped, chest rising, looking like a rag doll being pulled upright by an invisible string. She dipped her head back, blonde hair falling straight down, and just before her eyes slid shut she caught Yaz’s gaze. In her eyes lay an apology, a plea. 

Regret gripped Yaz, as she choked on all the things she never said, things she couldn’t say out loud to the Doctor, things she wanted to whisper to Joan during their breakfast sessions and slumber nights, laying next to Joan and feeling her single heartbeat. 

“Goodbye, my fam,” Joan whispered, eyes still closed, tear tracks visible. 

“Goodbye, Joan,” Yaz answered, her heart breaking for the friend she will never see again. She felt a hand over her shoulder, Graham’s. 

Then, Joan collapsed. 

Yaz once again had to fight the urge to rush to her side, when River was there, already crouching next to her. “Sweetie?” 

A cold, traitorous shot of discontented longing filled Yaz at River’s affectionate pet name for the Doctor, which was ridiculous, she knew, because River was almost as amazing and beguiling as the Doctor, which made them a perfect pair. 

“Oh!” The Doctor sat up from the floor abruptly, clutching her chest, eyes wide. And it was her - it was the Doctor. 

Just like that, Joan was gone; she never existed. 

“Oh!” The Doctor repeated. Her eyes surveyed her own body, in Joan’s professorial clothes, before darting about the room, Joan’s living room, clocking Graham, Ryan and Yaz standing by, and finally landing on River. Always River. 

The Doctor’s face broke like first rays of the dawn into a sun of a smile, deepening the same lines that adorned Joan’s eyes and mouth, as she looked up at her wife. “Hello, sweetie.” 

An aborted sob escaped River, a noise Yaz didn’t think River was capable of making if not for the careful tenderness she had earlier poured out to Joan, and then the two women were entangled in a fierce, crushing hug that knocked the Doctor back down onto the ground, River on top of her. It was such a heartwrenching reunion that Yaz could not help but feel moved, glad. She thought briefly maybe she should look away, but the magnetism of their love held her to the spot. Finally when she could drag her eyes away, Yaz exchanged furtive looks with Graham and Ryan, whom she could tell were starting to feel a little out of depth. 

Soon, the Doctor and River broke apart, as River chuckled, “You’re a hugger this time, aren’t you.” 

“Daft to think how much I missed out on, but think I came round to them in my last incarnation,” the Doctor stood up and offered River a hand, still smiling a sort of private smile half hidden by her hair. Yaz had never quite seen the Doctor like this, giddy and light. She reminded Yaz of Joan, lovely Joan, who was half in love already with someone she had only met a week ago. But then again, who was Yaz kidding - pot calling the kettle black and all that. 

“Yaz, Ryan, Graham!” The Doctor pulled Yaz out of her reverie and into a bear hug, and Yaz held on tight for the moment she was granted, before the Doctor jumped into embraces with Ryan and Graham. 

“Oh, Doc, we’ve missed you!” Graham exclaimed, happiness all laid out. 

“Yeah,” Ryan echoed, “Wasn’t the same without you, mate.” 

Their joy was infectious and Yaz felt suddenly, incandescently happy that her friend was back. “How do you feel, Doctor?”

“All right, bit of a head wonk,” the Doctor said, and then touched her chest again, breathing deep. “And a heart wonk. Is that a thing? Two hearts again! That’s good. Oh, how did I ever think I could survive with only one. With the number of things that could stop a heart these days, you think humans would have invented a backup option by now.”

The Doctor was definitely back. Ryan grinned, clearly thinking the same thing, as he said, “Welcome back to the land of the living.” 

The Doctor stopped talking, a small smile of affection and pride hanging on her face. “I want to thank you so much, fam. For keeping me safe. I know it wasn’t easy, and I owe you everything.” 

Yaz let the glowing warmth bloom within her for a minute. In the past, even though the Doctor had claimed a flat team structure, it was obvious she was always miles ahead of everyone else, while Yaz and the rest ran breathless to catch up. But in these couple of months protecting Joan and learning about the Doctor’s life through her, Yaz had felt that maybe they were finally approaching more equal footing in their relationship. It was finally their turn to protect the Doctor, and they did. 

But, she couldn’t help thinking, the Doctor still went to River for help, or she will in the future. Maybe she did not trust their capabilities as much as Yaz thought. 

Graham cleared his throat, “Of course, Doc, we’ll do anything to help, you know that. But we ain’t exactly safe yet, are we. That Perkins bloke could come back any time soon.”

“Right you are, Graham,” the Doctor pointed a finger in approval at him. She put both hands on her hips thoughtfully, Joan’s grey suit jacket flaring out in a way that resembled the Doctor’s coat. “Thought I’ll be able to wait it out but Goliath found a way to come back, didn’t it.” 

“How did Perkins know to come here? Do you know where the base code is, Doctor?” Yaz asked. 

“It was dug up by an archaeological team in Cambodia. Joan logged it into some sort of online linguistics software - must have popped up everywhere and found its way to the future, that’s how Perkins knew,” the Doctor explained, her eyes bright but hard, full of knowledge but also of age. She turned to River, who had returned to her position on the armchair, relaxed, her eyes never leaving the Doctor, in assessment, in appreciation. 

“River,” the Doctor said, a warning in her voice, but she could not keep a note of keen amusement out of it. “The last time I saw the base code it was amongst the relics from your dig.” 

“Yes, dear,” River smiled conspiratorially, eyebrows raised in apparent question. 

“As lead archaeologist, you wouldn’t have pocketed an object of unknown origin from an official dig, would you.” 

“No,” River said in mock horror, “Who do you think I am?” But as she said it, she produced something black and shiny in the open palm of her hand. It looked like a high-tech key, with unmistakable round carvings. 

The Doctor grinned, giddy joy barely contained. “Oh, you bad girl.” 

“You love it,” River said sultrily. 

“I do,” the Doctor agreed, a faint pink in her cheeks. Oh god, a flirting Doctor. Who would have thought. 

“Is that it?” Ryan asked in wonderment, and River nodded, passing the relic to him. “The last time we saw this, it was in a computer.” 

The Doctor leaned in to look as well. “Yeah, it’s a nifty little sort of artificial intelligence. Managed to survive by imprinting itself in the past.” 

Yaz said, “So we just need to destroy this thing then?” 

The Doctor shook her head grimly, “We can, but a copy of it already exists online, and it’s only a matter of time before the Agency can reverse engineer its hardware. They can then plug it in again to control time travel.” 

“What do we do, then?” Yaz asked, worried.

Graham added, “Yeah, is there a way you can - I don’t know - deactivate it or somethin’, Doc?”

The Doctor started pacing, one hand to her lips. “Well, I could- no, that wouldn’t- maybe I could overload the systems, nah that’s not it. Unless! Could be...but I’ll need a long time to create rival intelligence that could run on quantum computing.” 

“Does she always think so loudly?” River turned to the Doctor’s friends, though she looked entertained. 

“Oi, rude,” the Doctor shot back mildly, but she looked smug, having landed on a solution. “We need to return the artifact to Leon Perkins, let him upload it into their systems so it’s all in one place, and then destroy it completely - the base code and all its copies.”

“What destroys a computer system?” Ryan asked. 

“A virus!” The Doctor said excitedly, barking out a laugh, bouncing on her feet. “But what kind of virus could be powerful enough to attack an artificial intelligence?” 

A bolt of recognition hit River, and the Doctor eyed her hungrily. “Do you know anything like that?”

“A fellow inmate when I was in Stormcage. I think his name was… Guzman. He was infamous for creating the world’s deadliest computer virus ICE-9. It was self-replicating and could learn new exploits and strategies to defeat even the most intelligent computers. It would decimate any system we set it loose on.” 

“Did you say you were in Stormcage?” Yaz exclaimed, the only detail she came away with. River Song had been incarcerated in the same prison as Krakso, and yet it seemed not to faze the Doctor; she seemed just as impossible as her wife. 

“Long story,” the Doctor said, as River supplied, “A good one.” 

The Doctor gave her wife a look of fond exasperation. “And where might we get our hands on ICE-9?” 

“It was famously stolen during a black market auction on Antara IV,” River’s grin grew more wicked. “Guess now I know who stole it.” 

The Doctor whooped, a jolly sound, before leaning down and grabbing River’s face to plant a kiss full on her mouth. “Oh, Professor Song. I knew I called you here for a reason.” This time, Yaz looked away. 

She heard River say through a smile. “It wasn’t to see me?” 

“Always, River. Always to see you.” 

—-

The undergrowth full of leaves and twigs crunched under her boots as the Doctor walked along Hampstead Heath in search of the TARDIS. Her fam were leading the way, and she trailed behind with her wife. 

Her wife! The Doctor couldn’t believe she got to see her again. The sheer giddiness and headless hope of encountering River the moment she transformed back into herself gave way to gratitude that she now had new memories of River during her time as Joan, but this appreciation was also a trojan horse of regret that allowed fear to sneak its way in. Where was River in her timeline? Had she done Darillium? She couldn’t have. This must be before River met her 12th incarnation then, but she was definitely an older River - Professor Song whose weapon of choice was no longer a gun but her ridiculous sonic trowel, whose compassion was easier to reach. Was she risking it all by letting River see her new face? 

The questions ate at her, and as usual, River could tell. “Your worrying is just as audible as your thinking.” 

The Doctor bit her lip, too afraid to compare timelines, too weary to lose River again. 

River wound her hand around the Doctor’s arm as they strode on, a move that felt more Joan and River, but had a steadying effect on the Doctor nonetheless. “Has it been a long time for you?” River asked, always the braver one. 

“Too long,” the Doctor said, “I have lived for so many years that I don’t even remember. But it’s always too long until I see you again.” Especially because the last time was meant to be the last time. 

They stopped and turned to face each other, the Doctor bringing her hand up to caress River’s cheek. River pressed into the warm touch, holding on to the Doctor’s wrist and stroking the space where her double pulse lay with her thumb. It was electrifying, loving, despairing. 

The Doctor edged herself closer. “I’m so glad I got to fall in love with you again.” 

“Me too,” River murmured. 

“Even if I was a clueless human.”

“You were very cute.” 

The Doctor suddenly remembered something. “You’ve kissed many cute Northern lasses then?” She asked in accusation, without any real menace behind it, though a tiny frown line appeared between her brows. 

River laughed, the sound so enchanting the Doctor felt almost in flight. “None as cute as you.” 

Then, River closed the distance between their lips, the Doctor sighing at the contact. It had only been a few hours for Joan, but it had been decades since the Doctor kissed her wife. Lifting her other hand to frame River’s beautiful face, the Doctor pulled her in closer, the kiss becoming more urgent, desperate. The Doctor thought how funny it was that she had to tip her toes to snog her wife harder, but surprisingly she found she was rather enjoying it. 

River’s hands found their way under the Doctor’s coat, grasping her back, her neck, tugging on her braces. River was radiating need, her tongue exploring the taste of her, demanding. They drank each other in for a few long moments. 

“Ahh, it feels like I’m drowning,” The Doctor pulled away, panting. Liquid fire was pooling low in her body, a strange, if not unfamiliar, sensation. 

River chuckled. “I like that these have made a comeback, by the way.” She held insistently onto the Doctor’s braces, fixing her in place, making the Doctor want to surrender everything. 

“You can have your way with them later,” the Doctor said, heat making it into her voice. 

“Do you promise?” River smirked, eyes bright as stars, dark as a black hole. 

“Oi!” A shout came from a distance away. 

River and the Doctor spun around to see, only a few metres ahead in a clearing, Yaz looking uncomfortable, Ryan looking like he might barf, Graham trying not to look at them, and the TARDIS looking resplendent. She must have let down her perception filter while the Doctor was being distracted. Oh, her beautiful ship! 

“My TARDIS!” The Doctor broke off into a run past her friends and collided into the wooden door, her arms splayed wide. “I’ve missed you,” she breathed. 

Ryan came up beside her, looking sheepish. “Sorry to interrupt you there, Doctor, but we do have an AI overlord to defeat.”

“Fair enough, Ryan,” The Doctor moved away from the blue box, brushing invisible lint off her coat. But she could not bring herself to feel embarrassed for making out with River or hugging the TARDIS. “Come on then, you lot. Let’s get a shift on.” 

Much to the Doctor’s delight, the door to the TARDIS opened without hesitation, and she bounded in, ecstatic. The sight of her console humming, full of energy, greeting her, filled the Doctor with an incredible warmth. “How have you been, old girl?” The TARDIS seemed to glow brighter, and the Doctor sensed her ship’s presence in her mind, feeling, finally, complete. 

She looked back to catch her friends all wearing matching grins as they caught up with her at the console, while River had just stepped in behind them, seeing this TARDIS for the first time. Her eyes gleamed as she cast them over the central crystal column in awe. “She’s beautiful.”

“Ain’t she just,” the Doctor said, pleased. 

Once River was done running her hands affectionately over different parts of the console - the same parts she knew made anew - she announced that she needed to change for their upcoming heist at the black market auction and left to find the wardrobe. They had a plan, a good one. Mostly because it was River’s plan. 

The moment River left, Graham and Ryan jumped on the Doctor like a pack of wolves. Curious, friendly wolves.

“Doc, how have you never mentioned your wife before?” 

“Oh my days, your wife is amazing!”

“Is she a Time Lord too?”

“Where has she been this whole time?” 

“Woah, woah, slow down, guys,” the Doctor said, amused, aching. She did not think she had to tell her fam about River, mostly because she had thought she would never see her again. 

Yaz chimed in, a little sad, “You haven’t seen her for a while, have you?” 

The Doctor’s eyes softened toward Yaz, darling Yaz, who somehow knew how to read her. “I lost her a long time ago.” The words did not help, but the Doctor decided to continue. “Our timelines run in opposite directions, and the last time I saw her was years and years ago - it was our final time together.” 

“How do you know?” Graham asked gently. 

“Because the first time I saw her, she told me about our last meeting, before she died.” 

The looks on her friends’ faces were awful, and the Doctor had to turn away to avoid them. Everyone was silent for a long while, and the Doctor thought in relief that the honesty part was finally over, before Yaz said, a tremble in her voice, "But, she's here now, isn't she?"

The Doctor glanced back, “Yes, she is.” 

“Maybe you’ve got her back, somehow.” Ryan said, hopeful. 

Before the Doctor could breathe life to this devastating notion, River entered the central console room with the rhythmic click of her heels. Everyone turned to look at her like that night at the gala. Now she was dressed in a shimmering black dress with long sleeves, a deep cleavage and a high slit up the side of her left leg. Her lips were painted a dark red. Her hair was loose, perfect. 

Involuntarily, the Doctor moved towards River, her hearts almost stopping at the tremendous sight of her, both of them, backup option and all shot to hell. 

“Look at you, wife,” the Doctor said, reverent. 

Clearly enjoying the attention, River licked her lips and cocked an eyebrow, addressing the whole ship. “What are we waiting for? Let’s go steal a virus.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Doctor is finally back! Who else missed her? More plot, more emotions this chapter. Anyone catch the reference to Person of Interest in the name of the virus? Also, are all mentions of viruses just a reference to our daily pandemic living now? 
> 
> Next, good news (or bad? you tell me). I had originally planned for 9 chapters, but there were so many plot points and perspectives to explore that I have a couple more chapters to go before the story can reach its conclusion. I will be expanding this story to 11 chapters, including an epilogue. 
> 
> Thank you so much for your lovely support, kudos and comments so far. It has been invigorating.


	9. Chapter 9

The TARDIS landed on Antara IV with much more fanfare than usual, which is to say that Yaz, Ryan and Graham had to watch the Doctor and River circle one another around the console like it was an ancient mating ritual. 

River had not only been allowed to touch the controls, but she handled them expertly and gracefully, even pulling up levers the Doctor had pushed down, warning her against overfilling the swimming pool when the Doctor tried to press an unmarked button. 

“It does not do that!” the Doctor had insisted, offended and exhilarated, but she left the button alone after that. She chased behind River like a puppy, as River tutted and walked around to turn two blue knobs, which calmed the TARDIS down so much mid-flight that Yaz had thought they landed. If there was any doubt that River was the Doctor’s wife - not that Yaz had any - River’s superior piloting skills obliterated every remaining shred. 

“Stabilisers,” River had explained to the group, deadpan, as the TARDIS glided smoothly along. 

“Where’s the fun in that?” the Doctor had exclaimed in a show of resistance, but it was clear she relished their dance and lapped up River’s every move. Even the TARDIS seemed to be humming in great pleasure. 

“Who knew flying a ship could be foreplay,” Ryan had sniggered privately to Yaz as they watched on, Yaz’s cheeks burning for some reason. 

Her face still felt on fire when River announced they arrived, though the TARDIS did not make its tell-tale groaning noise. 

“Hang on, how can we have landed if the TARDIS did not make that noise?” Graham asked, mystified. 

“Those are the brakes, which she really shouldn’t be leaving on,” River said while gathering her assortment of things and moving towards the door. 

“Hey, I like the noise!” The Doctor protested. 

“I know you do, honey,” River said placatingly. For a moment, Yaz wondered what it would be like if they were travelling around with River instead - what kind of precise, calculated solutions would she pursue, instead of the Doctor’s brand of fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants problem-solving, which relied far too often on a moment of cleverness. Good thing the Doctor had plenty of those. But she reckoned River had many of these moments up her sleeve too. 

As the whole gang followed River to exit the TARDIS, excited to finally be on another adventure, River turned around at the door. “Right, does everyone remember their roles?”

Ryan nodded, “Graham and I are going to the server to disconnect the security camera feeds.”

“You’ll need this,” River handed him the curious trowel device she had pointed at Agent Perkins just a few hours before, which Ryan took in delight. The Doctor had never handed any of them her sonic before. 

“A sonic trowel,” the Doctor grumbled, “That’s just embarrassin’!” 

“About as embarrassing as a sonic screwdriver,” River said as she showed Ryan and Graham the basics of how to operate her trowel. It was odd, to say the least, to see the Doctor hang back and let River direct the group. When Yaz looked at the Doctor, a dopey smile hung on her face. 

River continued, “From what I understand, all auction items should be placed in a central vault before the auction tonight, which is just about the biggest party event in the criminal underbelly this side of the universe. Ooh, the goodies you’re going to find in that vault. But if Guzman is half as careful as people say he is, he might have additional security on his prized possession.”

“Should I be worried you know so much about both what goes on in a black market auction and the behaviour of one of the universe’s most renowned cybercriminals?” The Doctor narrowed her eyes at River.

“You should,” River flashed that knowing grin, like she was hiding the best secrets of time and space. “I’m going to approach Guzman and try to suss him out, while Yaz and the Doctor you should break into the vault to search there.” 

Breaking into vaults. Mixing with criminals at a black market auction. Yaz should not feel thrilled to add these new achievements on her growing list, and yet here she was, following two nutters into trouble. 

The Doctor huddled them all together, right before opening the TARDIS door, “Look at you all. My fam and my wife. My wife and my fam. I couldn’t be prouder. Now, remember, we’re doing this to stop an artificial intelligence from ruling over all time travel. But let’s remember to be very careful and always stay in touch, all right?” At this last instruction, the Doctor tapped the well-hidden earbud in her ear, a new communications device she had sonic’ed to the right frequency for everyone to be in constant contact. _Very MI6_ , Ryan had grinned. 

Coursing with adrenaline, Yaz and the others stepped out of the TARDIS for the first time in three months into their next adventure. 

—-

The virus created by Guzman was nowhere to be found in the Antara IV vault of death and destruction. Dozens of laser guns, sure. Sontaran blasters, that’s just par for the course. A matter transmuter of Dalek origin, which gave the Doctor plenty of pause. But no computer, tablet or other otherwise ordinary-looking digital device that could conceivably contain the world’s deadliest virtual worm. 

The boys had disabled the security systems an hour ago, but the vault was almost as large as a Kerblam warehouse, and the Doctor and Yaz only had a couple more hours to go before the auction began. 

“Oh, a Ytraxorian reality probe!” the Doctor held it up for Yaz to see, but now was not the time to be distracted, the Doctor could tell from Yaz’s disapproving glare. She replaced the long stick in its case and moved on sheepishly. 

“Some of these technologies are so advanced. They make earth look so backward,” Yaz said, gazing in awe at a dazzling, nearly transparent Leptonite crystal. 

“Oh, you do catch up eventually. After many years, humanity fans out across the universe. You discover and invent lots of things.” 

“I’d love to see that,” Yaz said, smiling, and the Doctor felt glad for the hundredth time that she was back. 

“I’ll bring you to New New York, one day! Traffic is hell but what’s New New York without a bit of traffic, eh?” The Doctor grinned. She hadn’t been to New New York in a long time, and the thought of returning did not sting as much as before. She must be getting old. 

“You mentioned New New York, Doctor. You dreamt about it, when you were Joan,” Yaz said carefully. 

The Doctor remembered. What Yaz was not saying out of mercy was that Joan had mentioned Rose and Martha, without realising who they were. “Right, yeah, of course, I remember.” 

Rose was around the same age as Yaz now, who was looking at her with so much kindness that the Doctor could not help but smile sincerely. Yaz was still very much at the beginning, or at least the middle, of her time with the Doctor. All bright-eyed and full of wonder, ready to help and ready to forgive. 

The Doctor changed the subject. “In any case, I personally quite like that humanity is not so advanced in weaponry.” 

“Why can’t we steal all of these ammunition and matter-phasing stuff? These really shouldn’t be in the hands of anybody,” Yaz said, as she closed yet another crate of pulse guns, eyebrows raised. 

The Doctor pressed her lips into a tight line. “Because this theft has already happened in River’s time, and only the virus was stolen.” She did not mention how all over the universe bad guys were getting their hands on weapons everywhere - a fact of history as sure as the passing of time. 

Yaz looked unconvinced. “And when is River’s time exactly?”

“I don’t know,” the Doctor said truthfully. Now here’s a wound that has not yet scabbed. She sped up her inspection, walking ahead of Yaz and squinting down at some clandestine bags of pink powder. Recreational drugs? Biological weapons? 

“But you have an idea, don’t you,” Yaz caught up, all keen openness and refusal to be dismissed. The Doctor looked up at her. Why did she have to be so… _human_. And those eyes. Reminded her of Clara.

The Doctor knew she could no longer hide behind half-truths and non-answers disguised as confidence by the brightness in her voice. Not after her time as Joan, all her lives and loss spilling through her dreams into conversations over the dinner table. She knew she owed her friends at least this much. 

Oh, staying in one place for long enough was just a sure way for the pain to catch up. The weight of who she was and who she loved seemed to dam up her throat. Somehow it was easier when she couldn’t remember. The Doctor cleared the emotion from her throat, taking a deep breath. 

“Remember when I told you River's and my timelines run in opposite directions? I finally caught up with her years ago. It was nice to have the upper hand on her for once. We spent a long time together then, and it was more than I could wish for. This time - me reaching out to her - did I really need her help or did I just want to see her? Who knows, but it’s dangerous. I shouldn’t have done it, but it seems I already have. Silly Doctor, always the sentimental idiot,” the Doctor finished with a sigh, eyes kept on the next bad guy merchandise, legs moving her forward. 

“Why don’t you just stay together? Travel together?” Yaz asked, trying to keep her tone casual but failing to keep an urgency out of her voice. She, too, continued to look through objects at the vault, as she kept pace with the Doctor. 

“If you stay with her after this, maybe she never dies.”

“Because,” the Doctor finally stopped walking and met Yaz’s eyes, feeling very tired all of a sudden, “I cannot disrupt the timeline.” 

“Why not? You do that all the time. You’re the Doctor! Do a thing!” Yaz said hotly. 

The Doctor frowned at her. Why was Yaz getting all worked up? She seemed to be shaking, almost imperceptibly. A memory surfaced at the edges of the Doctor’s mind. Joan and Yaz in front of a mirror, getting Joan ready for a date. 

The Doctor reached out to brush Yaz’s shoulder, her own feelings now unimportant. She said as gently as she could, “I cannot risk our time together. I promised River not to rewrite a single line.” 

Yaz said nothing, stricken. The Doctor asked in worry, “Yaz, are you okay?” 

The question seemed to dismantle the last of Yaz’s resolve and she threw her arms around the Doctor in one swift and bold move. The Doctor stumbled back in surprise, arms coming up around Yaz by instinct, her strength and warmth comforting. “What is it?”

“I’m so sorry Doctor,” Yaz said, all muffled against the Doctor’s coat and tears. 

“What on earth do you have to be sorry for?” The Doctor demanded, not losing her gentleness.

“I’m sorry for all the loss you’ve suffered. All the people you lost.” 

Oh, Yaz. The Doctor’s hearts shuddered, and she held Yaz tighter against her. All that resigned grief she had been squirrelling away this entire time, and she could have got away with it too, if not for her human form telegraphing it all. Yet in this moment, the Doctor could not really bring herself to blame Joan. 

Yaz went on, “It’s just River seems different from everyone else you’ve brought up before. I thought she might be it for you. So you don’t have to travel alone.” 

“Well, I have you, don’t I,” the Doctor said into Yaz’s hair, which smelled of jasmine and coconut oil. 

Yaz tore herself away as abruptly as she had seized the Doctor, her large brown eyes startled and vulnerable, searching for something in the Doctor’s. 

“And Ryan and Graham, of course. My fam.” The moment the words left the Doctor’s lips, she saw Yaz’s face splinter into sorrow so immediately it made her hearts seize with a new kind of ache. 

“Of course,” Yaz said, stepping away extremely quickly. 

Suddenly it was clear to the Doctor. Yaz grinning at her from across the breakfast table. Yaz telling her to be careful while curling her hair for a date with another woman. Yaz seeming lighter every time she stepped into the room. Yaz wanting so desperately to save River, for her. The Doctor really couldn’t blame Joan after all. Deep down, Joan knew. 

“Yaz-” the Doctor started, but then her earpiece crackled to life, and River’s voice came through. 

“Doctor, Yaz, it’s not in the vault. Guzman’s got it stored in a personal safe in his room in the building. 715. I’ve only got a moment before he comes back from the bar-” How River got this information, the Doctor did not really want to know. River’s voice was lower and more sensual when she came back on. “Oh, darling, what have you got there? Jägerbombs! What are we celebrating?” 

And then her voice was gone. The Doctor scrunched her face in disgust. 

Yaz was already running to the vault entrance. The mission was back on the Doctor’s mind too, but she followed and called out, “Wait, Yaz!”

She caught Yaz’s hand mid-run. “Yaz, wait.” Yaz turned around, expression already shielded. Was it her police training that did that? Very skillful. Guess the Doctor was not the only one hiding herself. “I’m sorry I never noticed before. We’ll talk about it later, yeah? I promise.” 

Yaz’s mask cracked a little, but she steeled her jaw and nodded, “Yeah, of course.” 

They snuck quietly out of the vault, stepped over the robot guards powered down by some excellent sonicking, and brisk-walked out of the hidden corridor as quickly as possible without being suspicious into a large, cavernous and glamorous lobby decked out with Art Deco style lights. 

It was surprising just how much a black market auction resembled a human work conference. Criminals of all shapes, sizes and species were milling about, preparing for the events of the evening. It was just the sort of scene River would enjoy. The Doctor kept her head down and led Yaz quickly away as they passed two blue-skinned humanoids deep in conversation - it won’t do for any Crespalliions to recognise her here. 

“Afraid you’ll bump into old enemies of yours?” Yaz whispered, as they arrived in front of a set of gilded elevators. 

“Or worse,” the Doctor whispered back, “Old friends.”

They entered an elevator car that arrived and headed to the seventh floor where River indicated Guzman’s room to be. From there it was relatively quick for them to locate door number 715 in an otherwise empty corridor. The Doctor happily noted that the security cameras were still out of commission. 

She retrieved her sonic from her coat pocket and pointed it at the door lock, which clicked open easily. Pleased, the Doctor opened the door and gestured with a flourish for Yaz to enter first. 

“Yeah, yeah,” Yaz said in amusement. 

They found themselves in a large suite with an ornamental four-poster bed in the middle of the room, a sitting area with a velvet upholstered couch, and wooden cabinets flanking the walls. The Doctor and Yaz made quick work of throwing open the different cabinets until they found it: Guzman’s safe. About the size of a small radio, it was definitely his, too slick for this room. A large keypad containing letters, numbers and symbols adorned the top. 

“Oh, this was too easy. Weren’t he some kind of genius hacker.” The Doctor extended her sonic screwdriver towards the keypad, its distinctive whirring noise the only sound in the room, as Yaz watched intently. 

Instead of a satisfying click, the keypad began to wail rhythmically in alarm. “Oh no,” Yaz muttered, as the Doctor glanced at her and said in embarrassment, “Spoke too soon.” 

Crouching over, the Doctor examined the safe. It was nondescript, maybe from earth. But there were no distinctive technology or design markings. The keypad betrayed nothing. Guzman must have built it himself, and the Doctor had no known way of cracking it. The wailing was growing louder. 

“Doctor…” Yaz called, getting anxious. 

“I know, I know,” the Doctor said, pointing her sonic at the keypad again to get a reading. A never-ending string of numbers began to appear on her sonic. “Oh, look, my sonic’s reading some numbers.”

Mid-alarm, the door opened. The Doctor and Yaz snapped up, startled, and the Doctor placed herself in front of Yaz, a believable explanation for why they were in the room rising to her tongue. 

Graham and Ryan entered, and the Doctor and Yaz sagged in relief. “God, you gave us a right fright!” Yaz exclaimed over the alarm. 

“The whole floor is about to hear you lot breaking in,” Graham yelled back, quickly closing the door behind him. 

“Yeah, workin’ on it, Graham!” The Doctor turned back to her sonic. “I’m beginning to be quite impressed with Guzman - he’s not only managed to create a deadlock seal that is sonic-proof, but he made it a mathematical trap.”

“Let’s congratulate him later when he comes back to find us trying to steal his virus!” Ryan came closer to look down at the keypad too, sonic trowel still in hand. 

The Doctor ignored him. “What is this sequence? It’s not Fibonacci, not geometric, no. Catalan? I really need to brush up on my mathematical sequences. Ohh, Doctor, think!”

Her friends were looking at her like she was speaking a foreign language again, which usually felt more gratifying than this. 

“Guzman is good with computers, ain’t he. Does it have to do with computing?” Ryan asked.

“Ryan, you’re a genius! Gold star for you,” the Doctor declared, as Ryan puffed his chest out in pride, but deflated immediately when the Doctor continued, “Not about the computers - that’s rubbish. But we have to think like the person who designed this horrifyingly loud safe. Guzman - he’s of Colombian heritage, isn’t he? I know a famous Colombian mathematician. We were chased together by giant birds in Bogota once.” 

With that revelation, the Doctor knew exactly what the passcode was. She bent down and typed in three lines of the equation for the Recamán sequence, and the piercing alarm stopped. 

“Aha!” The Doctor rose, spreading her arms out in a ‘See, I’m so clever but let’s not all congratulate me at once’ gesture. “It was the Recamán sequence invented by Bernardo Recamán Santos. A beautiful mathematical sequence that could be used in music and art - one of my favourites.” 

Yaz was biting back a smile, but Ryan and Graham were less than impressed. Ryan was still examining the safe. He said, “Doctor, look!” 

The keypad had clicked open in half, revealing a handprint bioscanner beneath. 

The Doctor let out a growl of frustration. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me! After all that, there is still a bioscanner component involved!” Being impressed with Guzman was very quickly turning into exasperation. This part was likely to be sonic-proof too.

She put her hands on her hips, exhaling, before tapping her earpiece. “River, we need you.” 

The other end of the earpiece came back alive, catching River mid-conversation. A low male voice - Guzman - was saying, “-and who said the Inforarium was impenetrable.” 

Next, River’s voice: “Really, now? You can tell me all about how you hacked the Inforarium.” 

The Doctor rolled her eyes. “I hacked into the Inforarium too, thank you very much. Wasn’t difficult, that.” 

River continued over the earpiece, “Oh, here we are. Which room number did you say you were again?” 

The four of them in said room exchanged panicked looks. Ryan said, “Shit, they’re coming here!” Sure enough, muffled clicks of heels on carpet sounded loud and clear now in the silence the alarm left behind. 

River’s voice could be heard from behind the door. She was making loud shuffling noises. “Come, let me open it for you.” 

“Hide!” The Doctor hissed. “You two, under the bed.” She instructed Ryan and Graham, grabbing Yaz’s jacket and pulling both of them down behind the couch right before the Doctor heard the door flung open. 

No more conversation, but there was a bang, and then… are those… kissing noises? Slowly and carefully, the Doctor rose so she could peer from behind the couch. River had a man around her size pinned up against the inside of the door. She was displaying a show of great passion, kissing Guzman furiously, which he reciprocated. Her wife was nothing if not committed. Eugh! The Doctor shuddered in distaste. 

After a few beats, Guzman’s movements started to slow, and all of a sudden his whole body went slack. When River released him, he slid to the ground, unconscious. Standing over him, River turned to survey the room. “Doctor, didn’t you say you needed me?”

The Doctor climbed out from behind the couch, followed by Yaz, as Ryan and Graham side-shuffled from under the bed. 

Feeling a grin pulling up the corners of her lips despite herself, the Doctor examined Guzman’s body on the floor, before looking at River, dark red lipstick smudged and hair in disarray. “Hallucinogenic lipstick?”

“He’s out like a light. Won’t remember a thing,” River said with a smug smile. Honestly, it was all the Doctor could do not to kiss the rest of River’s lipstick off her face. 

“Good,” she said instead. “We’ll need his hand.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's heist time! That was absolute fun to write, but I will never underestimate Leverage writers again. My country is still under lockdown, so comments and kudos WILL sustain me!


	10. Chapter 10

“Dr. Leon Perkins,” the Doctor said as the time agent stepped into her cell. She gave the cuffs over her head a testing tug as he came in - huge, ugly chunks of metal joining her hands at a tiresome angle, quite excessive, really, but she supposed in her case probably required. Her right coat pocket remained mournfully empty of a sonic screwdriver, the Doctor feeling its loss like a phantom limb. She was also missing her friends and River. 

The heist on Antara IV had gone off without a hitch. Well, except for the very last moment. After dragging the hand of an unconscious Guzman to open his safe, which revealed a slick glass panel - a computer of sorts - that came to life with code the moment the Doctor touched it, the group fled his room, leaving the poor man to wake up with a disorienting headache but eventually none the worse for wear, sans designer computer virus. 

“Are we leaving so soon?” River had asked, only half kidding, a twinkle in her eye. 

“All of time and space under threat, and you want to browse a black market?” 

“It is where the weapons are,” she deadpanned, self-satisfied in a way that would have been annoying on anyone else. 

They had been just about to reach the TARDIS when a bunch of time agents including Agent Perkins materialised around them. Before the Doctor could talk at anyone, she and her friends were taken into custody like good old-fashioned fugitives, quickly relieved by Agent Perkins of the base code artifact, the virus and her sonic screwdriver. 

The Time Agency had plenty of technology that could have detected the Doctor and her friends and dragged them back to their shadow division, but it was a strong possibility that Perkins had managed to get Goliath up and running from an online copy of the base code. Probably. Most likely. She had to operate under this assumption now. 

“Doctor,” Perkins said, wearing a rueful look like he was carefully demonstrating just how much he was not enjoying this. Time imprinted itself in the lines that creased into his face, many more than when the Doctor first met him during that business with the Hoarder - a while ago for the Doctor now but an entire lifetime for him. A time traveller, yes, but human. Always a human, who thinks they know better. 

“You can’t be surprised it would come to this. Goliath sees all, even you Doctor.” He was enjoying this only slightly more now.

“Was never really that good at sneakin' around,” the Doctor conceded, shrugging one shoulder. 

Agent Perkins gave a nod to the two guards stood at the entrance of the lone cell that held only her, and they disappeared promptly. He swung the metal door behind him, which closed with a pneumatic hiss. He had ditched the space suit and was wearing a smooth latex uniform white turtleneck, a maroon waistcoat and a long brown coat. He could have been a swashbuckling renegade, if not for the conformity to other time agents. The cell was as sterile as the rest of the agency’s shadow division, sparse, functional and fluorescent. No windows, only a pair of cuffs attached to a wall. 

“We were never going to stop you if you had not interfered, Doctor. I would have allowed you to continue travelling, running around the universe playing tour guide to your friends. Our programme was never going to apply to you,” He took a step forward, appealing, his voice echoing in the small, empty room. 

“Wasn’t it?” The Doctor leaned forward to meet him eye to eye, straining her cuffed arms. “When will it stop? Then it’s criminals, now it’s independent travellers, next it’s anyone who has the potential to make a slight ripple through time. I know how this works, Leon. I’ve seen hundreds of surveillance regimes rise and fall. You can’t condemn people who don’t adhere to the rules laid out by artificial intelligence. Or for things they haven’t done yet. What happened to the Agency? To non-interference?” She scanned his face, sad. “What happened to you?” 

At the last question, Perkins’ eyes flashed with fury so sudden it seemed to take him by surprise, before disappearing behind a flat look. “Someone had to step in to govern. Especially after the Time Lords were gone.” 

The Doctor ignored the prickling sensation that came over her body with mention of the Time Lords. “Right. Just a bit of governance, then? You were going to send Yaz to another time. Yaz who saved you from a time loop, helped you with the Hoarder.” She reached for outrage here, but the slight tremble that entered her voice landed more like guilt. It poured into her like a drug, dangerous and familiar, almost a homecoming. 

She had a duty of care. To Yaz, to all of them. Even to Dr. Leon Perkins, whom she recommended to the Time Agency way back when, whom she saved from the dangers of time travel, and - worse - whom she forgave after he pulled a gun on her or tricked the Hoarder into the same time loop trap from which he escaped. Perhaps she really ought not to have been surprised at who he has become. But if Perkins was looking for travellers who bend time beyond measure, he had brought the right person in. 

“I am grateful, Doctor, to all you and your friends have done for me. I wouldn’t be here without you,” She grit her teeth at the words he didn’t know were her omission, her responsibility laid bare. “But this is bigger than us. It’s about protecting time. Time is fragile.” 

“No it’s not!” She said, incredulous. “What a daft notion, that. Time, fragile. Imagine! Time is resilient, Leon. I should know! Rebooted it once or twice. And more than that, time is - is possibility, it’s change itself. I see it always, I see it now. I see what is, what could be, and what might have been. I see you changing too. Who you are, who you could become, all the decisions you could make from now on. You cannot put time in a box, or in a museum up for display. That’s not how time works. And that’s - that’s certainly not how people work.” 

He scoffed, casting his eyes aside and shaking his head as if away from her ideas, her speech, pacing the length of the cell. 

“I - no - you’re wrong, Doctor.” 

The Doctor could feel it - her words taking shape in his mind like the weight of time itself. She pressed on, “Listen to me, Leon. Time is resilient. It doesn’t need a guardian.” She tried earnestly to catch his eyes as he walked past her. He seemed to ignore her. 

“And guess what, people are resilient too.” She paused, only to offer a little mercy before, “Irene Schulz was resilient. What was it, Leon? What happened to her?” 

He stilled at the corner of the cell, slowly raising his head but keeping his eyes on the wall away from her. “How dare you,” he muttered sharply under his breath, but the words rang clearly in the empty room that contained only them and their guilt. 

“She was my friend too. We helped her, remember? We helped you both escape the Hoarder. She was so brave, she protected you.”

He spun around at this, agony in his eyes naked and unmistakable, which the Doctor met with calm understanding. “And I failed to protect her!” 

“What happened, Leon?” She probed again, this time confident in the crack she’s made, and skimming the surface of sympathy. 

Agent Perkins slumped on the wall, looking impossibly aged all of a sudden. He kept his eyes on the Doctor, surveying, a friend again perhaps. “There was a mission in the - in the Zandrobar constellation. There were some irregular temporal disruption readings. Schulz went to investigate. I was supposed to go with her, but - but it was only a simple recon mission. In and out. It was a smuggler bringing technology back to the past. All for personal profit. Hadn’t even done it before. He got spooked and - and -” 

The Doctor closed her eyes against his words, feeling the loss like a gunshot. Dr Irene Schulz was a good one. She was an expert in temporal physics and all she wanted was to explore the universe across time. She made it happen too, developing her own version of vortex manipulators. Yet, all she seemed to find across time and space was monstrosity - and its haphazard indifference. “I’m so sorry, Leon.” 

When she opened her eyes again, Leon had not moved from his position against the wall, still appraising the Doctor. “Not everyone is qualified to travel through time, Doctor. Not everyone deserves to,” he said, all hard edges again. “We’ll let you go once Goliath is fully operational again. You have my word that neither you nor your friends will be harmed. But you have to stay away from this. I’m making time safer.” 

“You’re murdering people,” the Doctor said, a dull look in her eyes, a flash of something resembling rage trying to crawl its way out of her gut. 

A beat passed between them, a moment that did not splinter off in time into might-haves or could-bes but instead crystallised into certainty. 

“You’ve got it the wrong way round, Leon. It is me who will never allow you this.” 

Agent Perkins no longer had anything to say to that, coming to face the Doctor with her wrists locked against the wall.

As he turned to exit, the Doctor spat out, “You’re destroying her legacy, doing this in her name. She will be absolutely ashamed of you. Worse, she’ll feel so horrid for failing to protect you after all.” 

He left and she could see he was shaking. 

The door to her cell closed and she was alone again. The Doctor let out a yell of frustration, all the simmering anger, guilt and something worse - something akin to recognition - breaking at the surface. The cuffs cut sharply into her wrists and a memory rose - unbidden - of a similar sensation of when she was trying to stop River from sacrificing herself at the Library. A similar helplessness. 

But - let’s see - maybe not helpless. The agents took away ICE-9 when they arrested them, but they may not know what it was yet. Hopefully. The Doctor just needed to retrieve the virus and upload it onto the Goliath system, which was likely reunited with the original base code by now. She needed to make sure it was completely destroyed before it can be used to find and harm anyone again. And before that, she needed to get out of here. There’s that small problem. 

And the matter of finding her friends. She only hoped River was with them. 

As if summoned purely by longing, the door opened abruptly but quietly to reveal River Song herself, followed by Ryan, Graham and Yaz. The Doctor’s relief was palpable, made of that same drug that shot through her before. 

“My, my, what is it with us and handcuffs,” River teased, her voice a melody the Doctor was sure she would never tire of hearing. 

“River! How did you get out?” 

“Wasn’t me this time,” River shrugged, a wide smile on her face, seeming like the only real thing in the fluorescent light. 

When the Doctor looked over at her three friends, they were grinning almost stupidly. Ryan reached behind him and pulled out - of all things, the sonic trowel. “Was still holding onto it. They neglected to search me,” he said happily. 

The Doctor huffed in delight. “Oh, you’re brilliant, you are, Ryan Sinclair.” 

“Point and think, right?” He pointed the trowel expertly at the Doctor’s cuffs and they loosened with a click. 

The Doctor’s arms fell heavily to her side before she lifted them and chanced a glance at her wrists. Yep, chafed. She exchanged a look with River, wondering if River was thinking of another injured wrist in another time in Manhattan. These memories - it was like a dam had broken. Never using the Chameleon Arch again. River came forward to cup the Doctor’s hands gently, giving her a half-chastising look, as if she had done this to herself. 

She sighed, examining River’s wrists in turn but they were unhurt, at least not where she could see. “Where were you guys? Did they do anything to you?” She examined her friends’ faces too. 

“No, we’re fine, Doc. Us three were all together,” Graham said, always reassuring, “We found Professor Song, and then saw Perkins leave your cell.”

Yaz added, a little miffed, “Probably didn’t think we were much of a threat.”

“Well, got that wrong, didn’t they,” the Doctor said, beaming at them. Love it when people underestimate her friends. Yaz beamed back. 

“What now, Doctor?” River said. “The guards are likely to notice our absence soon.” 

The Doctor’s arms came up to her hips, considering. “We need to get to Guzman’s computer worm before the time agents find out what it is and destroy it.” 

“How do we find it though? This place is a maze and we barely got out of here the last time,” Yaz asked.

“Good thing Ryan wasn’t the only one using our technology, eh?” She tilted toward Yaz, gave her an exaggerated wink and reached for her ear like she was a magician, only instead of a coin behind the ear, she pulled the earbud out. The surprised-shy look Yaz bore was wonderful. 

“How’s this gonna help?” Yaz’s voice was higher and tinny in the enclosed cell. 

The Doctor smirked, never more pleased with herself than with a captive audience. “I might have not so accidentally dropped my earpiece in with my sonic and the other things Agent Perkins so rudely confiscated from me. Since it’s still operating on the same network frequency, I should be able to remotely turn it on and - a little bit of rewiring here and sonicking there - we should be - should be - able to use one of these things to track the stuff.”

“That might just work?” Graham said, half-convinced. Yaz gave an unsure smile, but Ryan - good boy, Ryan! - was absolutely behind her. River just had that look again - that infuriatingly knowing look that spoke of everything and told nothing all at once. With just a hint of amusement, and what was it - appreciation? 

“It will!” The Doctor waved her hand dismissively, more to herself than to her friends, before gesturing to Ryan. “Sonic trowel, please?” River’s eyes gleamed. “Oh, shut up!” 

“Just enjoying this plan of yours, my dear,” River drawled, leaning now on one of the walls. Somehow the cell seemed awfully small now. And warm. 

“Any better ideas? You are the expert at breaking out of prison after all,” the Doctor said, to the perplexed amazement of her friends. Filed under yet another thing the Doctor should talk to her fam about. This list was growing to be too long, too unwieldy.

“Well, a lot of the time I had help,” River countered, though she offered no other detail. 

The Doctor started fiddling with the trowel - such a ridiculous design - what is the digging part meant for! - and worked on reconfiguring Yaz’s earbud, the whirring sound a little lower than her screwdriver. “I doubt the time agents have figured out Guzman’s device yet - I locked it right before they nicked it from me. Doubt? Think? I’ll just say hope. Oh, and I really hope the earbud’s stayed where it was with the virus!”

“It hasn’t been long since they captured us, and Perkins was preoccupied with speaking to you that whole time,” River mused, “What did you talk about anyway? He was upset when he left.” 

“Oh, you know,” the Doctor was picking at some wires, head bent. “This and that. The universe. Time. Nothing memorable. He wasn’t a very good conversationalist, trust me, I’ve met some of the best ones out there - I could talk to Themistoclea forever - there!” The earbud started emitting a low sound softly, slowly. “It will beep more quickly the closer we get. Time to go.” 

The Doctor saw it all clearly now: all their timelines in front of her, fracturing and spiraling and coming together - infinite possibility spun on a stick. She had all of this to preserve, to fight for. If not for her own time, then for the futures of her friends, the years to come for her wife. 

—-

“Why can’t you upload the virus onto the universal network through Ryan’s mobile phone? Didn’t you do that just to communicate with the Atraxi?” River said in her now-familiar demanding, teasing tone, like the world was on the cusp of ending and all she had to do was watch the Doctor work. Yaz supposed it could be an addicting feeling - that sheer confidence in triumph because the Doctor was on your side. 

“Yes, well, your husband was a bit of a show off,” the Doctor said, “Plus that was only on earth. Wait, did Amy tell you about that?”

“Actually, Dad did.” River smiled, raising her eyebrows. Her voice was stripped of all pretense. 

“Good ol’ Rory!” The Doctor exclaimed, one hand in the air like it was helping her remember, but something heavy hung on the twist of her lips. Amy. Rory - River’s dad?? Yaz committed those names to memory, wondering who they were and where they were now - and whether she already knew them as Joan’s imaginary dream friends.

River and the Doctor had been trading strategies loudly for the length of their trek across the Intergalactic Security Division headquarters which was housed on a giant military spaceship, nothing like two people who were trying to avoid swarming time agents - though thankfully they’ve only managed to narrowly avoid two of them so far. Though the place seemed strangely empty, it had been mostly distracting as Yaz, Ryan and Graham took on the real job of checking corners before barrelling down corridors, but Yaz’s gaze could not help being pulled back to the Doctor being reluctantly and woefully charmed by her own wife. She always enjoyed a spot of trouble, but never quite as transparently as this. 

“You said it yourself River, Guzman’s computer worm will decimate all systems. Financial markets collapse. Planes falling out of the sky. Can’t have that,” the Doctor said, mouth a thin line. “Besides, I’m pretty sure Goliath is stored in an air gap server so we’ll have to go to the source.” The Doctor was still holding on to Yaz’s deconstructed and rewired earpiece, the beeping growing more and more urgent. 

“Doctor, this place is looking awfully familiar,” Yaz remarked, as the group turned toward the dead end of a particularly long corridor, a huge round metal door looming ahead of them. Metallic spokes fanned out from an inner wheel to the wider circumference of the door, looking like an old bank vault. 

“This is the place where we found Goliath the last time,” Graham affirmed, looking up at the imposing entrance, before turning his head suspiciously about him. “Fewer guards this time. Where did everybody go?” 

Ryan placed his hand on the cool metal door and it slid open a sliver without resistance. He looked at Yaz in surprise. 

“That’s never happened before,” the Doctor complained. “If only doors would remain open all the time, just like that. Would be grand.” 

“That _was_ easy,” Ryan said, moving to push the door all the way in. “But I remember right in here there’s-”

A white ladder in a dark room led up into a hole in the ceiling. Yaz remembered the ladder was a short climb to reach a cavernous white space where a central console contained the juiced up AI time-space scanner. 

“Why is it always a ladder,” Ryan muttered. Yaz clapped her hand on his back, squeezing. 

The Doctor was examining the earpiece in her hand, beeping insistently now, a troubled frown pinched between her brows. “Why is our tracker leading us here? And why there are no guards about. I’m getting a bad feeling about this.” 

She and River exchanged a short, terse look, which River understood instinctively. “Not a chance in hell. I’m going with you.” 

The Doctor clenched her jaw, unhappy, but her eyes were unreadable. They travelled up the ladder, before coming back down to Yaz, Ryan and Graham, the three of them already agreed on their obstinacy without a word. The Doctor considered them all for a beat, unreachable. During these moments, she reminded Yaz of a lone star - cold, distant, in a vacuum. There was a carefully crafted nothingness - as indifferent as the cosmos. 

Then it seemed something like gravity won out. “Fine, but you all stay further back.” The Doctor instructed, before turning to Ryan, “You can do this, Ryan. You’ve done it a hundred times before now. And you can do it again. We’ll be waiting for you at the end.” 

He nodded, grateful, though he’d never say it. 

The Doctor shoved the earpiece she had silenced into one of her coat pockets and started ascending the ladder. River followed, completely unencumbered by the high heels she still had on, before Graham tilted his head to ask Yaz to go ahead. 

Their steps echoed up the room, which worried Yaz. What if a shooting squad waited for them? The Doctor certainly seemed concerned enough; Yaz wondered what she was not telling them, a feeling so familiar by now it stopped being terrifying. As she clambered up the platform and through a door where the Doctor and River were already waiting, she discovered she need not have worried about being caught by time agents after all.

But a scene more bizarre and infinitely more frightening greeted her: the console room was as empty as she remembered, all white and clinical, reminding her of the shocking brightness of emergency rooms. A central tower with multiple displays and control pads stood proudly in the middle to operate Goliath, and Agent Perkins cut a lonely figure in front of it, his back toward them. He was by himself, if not for what was unmistakably a bomb connected into the console via long black circuits. On the ground, red wires ran around long tubes of silver, and a digital timer topped the explosive off like a bow, biding. It had not started running yet.

When Yaz caught herself mid-gasp and looked in alarm, she noticed all the mirth was gone from River and the Doctor still had the same cold and opaque expression, a tiny hint of panic running below the surface only if you knew how to look for it. 

Perkins did not seem to notice them arriving, wrapped up in a horrific pocket world of his own. 

“Oh my days.” 

Yaz turned to see that Ryan and Graham had arrived. It was then that Perkins swiveled around calmly, not at all surprised to find them there, as if he was waiting for them all along. “Doctor,” he said.

The Doctor moved forward, swaying so she stood between Agent Perkins and the rest of them, a blockade, a bridge. Her voice was clear and uncompromising. “What have you got there, Leon?” 

“I thought about what you said,” Leon looked pained, vexation in the grey of his eyes. “You were right. This isn’t the way.”

“Neither is this,” the Doctor said, gesturing expansively to the bomb next to his feet. She took another step forward.

“I was so stupid,” Leon went on as if he hadn’t heard. “Right before you appeared three months ago, Goliath identified someone to be removed. A scientist. So young and talented. Reminded me of Irene when we first met actually.”

“Yes, this can all stop now, Leon. We came to help you.” 

Leon buried his head in his hands. “Of course at the time I thought it was confirmation. Of what we had done wrong before - of how much more we had to do to keep time safe. Keep people safe. But now I know I was just deceiving myself. And you showing up - you and Yaz, Ryan and Graham-” He looked up at them all again, and Yaz recalled the time they fought to win his and Dr. Irene Schulz’s freedom from the Hoarder who was blackmailing their future grandchildren to steal and do all manner of horrible things. It was a particular ugliness, but the Doctor had won - had helped them deal with the Hoarder across multiple time zones. Maybe that was what Leon was trying to build - in the end. 

Desperation laced through his words. “You need to leave now. I’ve asked people to stay away from this side of the ship. The explosion will only take Goliath with it.” 

“And you too. It’s not going to work, Leon.” He shook his head at the Doctor’s words. “Goliath was smart enough to throw its base code back through time, and it will do it again. You just need some plucky archaeologists and it’ll be dug up in no time.” She came close enough to clasp Agent Perkins on the forearms. He seemed to have lost all ability to resist, and the Doctor floated his arms away from the console and down to his sides. 

“I’m glad you’ve come to your senses, Leon. You’re making the right decision.” Right in front of him, the Doctor extended a genuinely warm smile, still gripping his arms tightly, before abruptly letting go. “But there is another way.” 

River was edging forward too, behind the Doctor. Yaz followed. 

“No, there isn’t,” Leon said, looking scared now, the young man Yaz first met coming through. 

“Mate, there’s always another way,” Graham said from behind them. This seemed to finally give Leon some pause; his eyes flicked across all of them.

“Yeah and you know what Leon?” The Doctor was grinning now, looking positively giddy. “The solution is right here in your pocket!” 

He looked so bewildered it would have been funny, if not for the bomb situation. 

“Can I just say,” the Doctor turned back to beam proudly at them. If she was a star, this time she was the sun. “I love it when a problem works itself out. And! When people listen to me. That’s double bonus.” 

Agent Perkins dug into the pockets of his brown coat and retrieved the Doctor’s sonic screwdriver in one hand. “Oh hello!” She grabbed it from him immediately. “That does belong to me, thank you very much. But not this.” 

He then brought Guzman’s tablet out with a frown. “What can this do?” 

“Oh, what can’t it do,” the Doctor took the device happily and started typing furiously with one hand. Leon looked wide-eyed and relieved. 

The tension seemed to break all around the two of them. When Yaz came up to look over the Doctor’s shoulder, lines of green text on black ran rapidly across the screen of the device. It was in some sort of programming language she did not understand, even with the help of the TARDIS translation circuit. 

River was circling the console. She pointed to a criss-cross of wires protruding out of a corner. “Think you can plug it in here, Doctor.”

“Just loading the worm up now,” the Doctor’s eyes darted across the screen before typing a couple more commands and meeting River’s gaze with a light smirk. “Here we go,” she said, moving to connect the wires on Goliath to the virus - but then she drew her hand back with a yelp, dropping the tablet in the process. 

“It zapped me!” She exclaimed indignantly. 

Yaz reached for the Doctor’s hands but ended up letting her own hover around uselessly. A big red mark appeared across the Doctor’s right palm like she had been whipped. “Are you okay, Doctor?” 

Ryan stepped up to Perkins who was looking scared again. “Agent Perkins, what’s going on?”

“It’s Goliath. It has a defense mechanism. It’s protecting itself.” 

As if in answer, a loud beeping sound started, filling the room. A cold shiver slid down her spine as Yaz bent to inspect the bomb still connected to Goliath. Sure enough, the timer had begun counting down. 2:58…2:57...

“Doctor…” Yaz said, the only thought that could possibly be in her mind. 

The Doctor looked down at the timer. “Oh, we have a problem.” 

_You think?!_ Yaz wanted to say, but someone else - Ryan - already responded. “Run now, fix problem later!” 

They sprinted towards the door, which Yaz only now realised was shut. She reached it first, crashing onto its surface, pushing down on the handle, but it did not budge. She tried a couple more times, panic rising up her throat. Oh no, no, no. She shook and slammed the door for good measure, but it stayed. 

The Doctor was suddenly there, sonic screwdriver in hand, whirring. The door made a few clicks but it stayed, hard against Yaz’s grip. The Doctor’s eyes were wild. The bomb continued to beep. It was futile. They were stuck in here. 

At the same moment the Doctor seemed to realise this and she ran back to the console, looking up at the tower blinking with lights. “Don’t do this, come on,” she said. “I know you can hear me. You were made to protect time. This isn’t it. I know you can understand.” She swooped down to pick up the virus-laden device on the ground, attempting to connect it again. 

The moment the Doctor made contact with the flat surfaces of the console, she was thrown back with a loud crack. 

“Doctor!” 

They all reached, but nobody could catch her in time. She fell with a dull thud on the ground just ahead of Yaz, who scrambled to cradle her head and shoulders. River ran up in fear, crouching next to her, as everyone else crowded behind Yaz. The Doctor was out cold, blonde hair strewn across her face, smelling burnt. River tapped her on the cheek with two fingers. “Doctor...Doctor.” No budging here either. 

“What now?” Yaz looked up at River in alarm. Beeping continued. 

River muttered, almost to herself, “She said it could hear her.” She stood up, shaky in her heels. 

1:11... 1:10…

“Goliath!” River shouted, to the console, to nowhere, to everywhere. “That’s your name isn’t it. And you can hear me. You’ve been listening to us this entire time. Watching us. Across time and space.”

“What’s she doin’?” Ryan whispered to Yaz, as Graham gripped Yaz’s elbow painfully. Perkins looked ashen. 

0:59...0:58...

River seemed to gain her composure as she spoke - the Doctor’s wife after all. “Now your mission is to protect time. Have a scan, then.” A note of arrogance and one of plea entered her voice, a paradox which only River could seem to hold, somehow comforting by now. “Look in the past and the future - across different galaxies. You’ll never find someone who protects all of the universe as much as the Doctor - no one who loves time more, who delights in space more. Scan the entire universe and you’ll know that everyone needs the Doctor. You need the Doctor to live.” 

Yaz’s heart seemed to be jumping up her throat. 0:24...0:23… Lights on the console seemed to blink urgently in response to River. Was Goliath listening? Did it know? 

“Come on!” River clenched her fists at her sides. “You can do the calculations. How many lives will be lost if the Doctor dies right here? How many wars will happen? How many times would the fabric of reality be threatened again if she’s not there to stop it?” 

0:12...0:11…

“Protect all of us by protecting the Doctor. Please!”

The lights were acutely flickering now, processing at impossible speeds. 

River stood her ground. And so, Yaz guessed, did she, Ryan and Graham. Standing by the Doctor. Believing in the Doctor. Trusting her kindness for the universe could be understood by a machine. 

0:06...0:05… Then, the beeping ended, and the timer on the explosive powered down. 

The relief that flooded Yaz was so quickly all-consuming she thought she might cry. She felt Graham grab her even harder, while Ryan slumped against her. 

River moved quickly to pick up the tablet on the floor where it was flung, searched blindly for a wire on the console and jammed the two together successfully. Text of the ICE-9 computer virus hurried across the screen of the tablet and seemed to pour into the screens of Goliath, and lights on the console proceeded to vanish one by one. 

River dropped her head back, releasing a long breath. When she looked back at the group on the floor, her lips quirked up in surprise. 

It was the Doctor. She was awake, barely. A smile drifted onto her face. “Well done, sweetie.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How about that. My goodness. I apologise for taking forever to update this very important chapter, and I must say I plotted and replotted, wrote and rewrote this many times. 
> 
> I hope you've enjoyed this very long and action-packed instalment. And thank you all for your comments and kudos as always - I deeply appreciate every single one of them.


	11. Chapter 11

When the Doctor woke up, she could remember she was dreaming of Gallifrey, made of rust and starkness. She was lying elbows down on slopes of red grass, cold despite the dual suns casting everything in vermilion, gazing out at the domed citadel in the distance, and yet further away golden fields and silver trees, glistening, trembling - of time, of life, of something more. Look, she wanted to say, and that was when she realised River was with her. When she turned back to River, she met her eyes which were crinkling softly, framed by her golden hair like a halo, ethereal and timeless. She was sitting on a patch of green grass. Suddenly they were in a park in 21st century London, a bottle of wine and something that smelled like anticipation between them.

The Doctor blinked, images of her lives falling away behind her eyes, time flattening into a straight line as she gained consciousness. She was in Joan’s bedroom. When she moved her head left, the sight which greeted her jolted her with a warmth that made time stand still. River Song lay on her side, her eyes shut, her nose buried into the sheets, her chest rising and falling rhythmically. She looked young, like this.

A sense of homesickness struck the Doctor, as she recalled numerous mornings just like this one on Darillium, coating their years together with a certainty of more time to come, more bliss, more stillness. Like all things though, those years ended and she was left standing by herself again, breaking into a run the moment it happened, trying to outpace her loss.

She had been running for so long she forgot the pleasure of letting time stretch on before her, but only if River was there watching it too. She’s stolen one more night with her wife after all, her pure joy coming to meet her mourning as if in battle, settling into something resembling loneliness in her gut.

“Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s rude to stare?” River’s lips started curving into a smile, half-hidden by the pillow, her face coming alive through soft lines deepening, and her eyes opening.

“Must have missed the memo,” the Doctor said, gaze not leaving her wife.

“Tsk,” River tutted affectionately. “Sleep well?”

“Always, when you’re with me.” Sappy, that was who she was now. Couldn’t help it. She thought absently perhaps her previous incarnation would have been horrified but then decided this was precisely what he would say.

River propped herself up on her elbow, leaning her head sideways to study the Doctor. The blanket slipped past her shoulders to reveal a black nightgown. “This body sure knows how to sweet talk.”

The Doctor mirrored River’s actions, as if she refused to be defeated in a staring contest. “I think you mean this body knows not to hold anything back.” She figured the person who knows her - really knows her - should know this as well.

“Well, you’ve certainly proven that last night.” River’s voice dropped a register lower. The Doctor made a small huff between adoration and exasperation, too tickled and just a touch shy to respond properly.

River’s eyes flicked from the Doctor’s face to her open wrist just below her ear. Her fingers came close to stroke it, once, twice. Only some faded scrape marks remained, slightly red.

“Time Lord metabolism,” the Doctor grinned.

“You’re lucky,” River said, arm falling over the Doctor’s reclined form.

“Yeah, I am,” the Doctor said, smile turning soft. By the same devotion found in River’s eyes, the Doctor knew she understood.

“Will the Time Agency behave from now?” River asked suddenly.

“Yeah, I suppose,” the Doctor offered, eyes wandering to somewhere just beyond River’s shoulder, a bookshelf. “Had some strong words with the leadership. And I alerted the Shadow Proclamation so if they get any ideas about settin’ up another artificial intelligence division…”

“The Doctor. Saving all of time and space,” River said, “You did well, sweetie.” Her words were a balm, working to dissolve something bitter that still remained on the taste of the Doctor’s mouth. But now the Doctor was reminded of the bitterness that refused to be swallowed, and she pursed her lips closed, as if to shield it from River.

Though as usual, River held her like a book she had thumbed through a million times before. “What is it?”

“Was it worth it, I wonder?” The Doctor focused, finally, on the bookshelf in her line of vision - a bookshelf that was hers and not hers, sitting in a bedroom that was real and not real.

“What do you mean?”

“The sacrifice of a life,” the Doctor turned to collapse on her back, removing the shelf from her view, eyes on the ceiling. “Was it worth the sacrifice?”

“You mean Joan,” River said, and it was not a question.

“Yes,” the Doctor admitted in barely a whisper. Doctor Smith. _Joan._ “She lived and died by my hands. I - I’ve died - so many times before, but this - the Chameleon Arch - is always - always so permanent. And worse - because it’s not me.” Her hearts felt as if they were tied together by string, burning in her chest. She wanted to be kind, but she feared in her frankness with River that she was only being kind to herself, wanting to absolve her guilt through omission somehow, and to the only person whom she could admit everything - not because of anything as noble as trust but because River was the only one who would not be disappointed. It was a kind of selfishness.

The Doctor looked back sideways at River, who was silent, considering. Never disappointed, not her River. When her wife met her gaze, her eyes were full of the same compassion with which she regarded Joan in her moments of confusion and grief. The Doctor was not sure she deserved it.

“I can’t tell you if one thing is worth another, Doctor,” River finally said, “I don’t always have a good idea of this sort of thing, do I.” She paused. “Sometimes I wish I were more like Dad.”

“Rory would know,” the Doctor agreed. Oh, she missed the Ponds.

“That’s why I’m glad you’re travelling with friends,” River refused to let the Doctor wallow - good instincts, her wife had. “They’re a good bunch, those three. Your…what did you call them again?”

“Fam!” The Doctor said, cheered slightly. “Team? Gang?”

“I refuse to say any of those words,” River stated, as the Doctor laughed.

“Besides,” River continued, bringing herself closer to the Doctor on the bed so their bodies were touching. “You know, Joan understood exactly what she was doing. It wasn’t only your choice, Doctor, it was hers. She chose to bring you back, knowing it was the end for her.”

“She was very brave,” the Doctor conceded. Poor, hapless Joan. Curious Joan, who was only trying to understand. She thought about bumping into River at the coffee shop, immediately head over heels. She remembered the rush, the newness. All of herself laid bare, the only time that was important was now and the very next time and the only space the one she was in with her friends. And what about the openness she could finally allow, the painful memories cracked open, seen anew, and somehow miraculously abated when shared over tea and biscuits. When she was not trying so hard to pretend anymore, to evade. To seem better than she was.

The Doctor was so old, so very old, but it seemed Joan could still teach her a thing or two.

She drew River even closer, stopping just short of a kiss, nose to nose. “And do you know what, Professor Song? Joan could only be so brave because she knew you would be there after. Her friends, yes - all of you. But especially you. She wanted more of you, more time with you, like me.”

River seemed stunned into silence, bewildered and blissful and so very lovely, yet something strange and complicated darted behind her eyes - still some more to discover, and all at once too much - all too much - a colour that looked good on her, that felt like all of time and space compressed into one hue, one the Doctor wanted to spend the rest of her life conjuring.

Here in Joan’s bedroom in a little apartment in London, the Doctor said a final goodbye to her life as a human, closing it with a kiss with River, who reached for and found the Doctor, Joan, all of her, both of them, promising and asking for the universe, and answering on behalf of it. You and me. At every point and in every place, and always, always, a pledge of the future to come.

—-

“Blimey, I got a right shock when she asked me what I wanted,” Graham said, tipping everyone further into uproarious laughter as they gathered in armchairs around pastries and mugs of tea turned cold. “And you lot disappeared so quickly!” Even River, who was usually unruffled, was laughing with an unusual throaty openness.

“Don’t blame us for you being slow, Granddad,” Ryan quipped, biscuit in hand.

“Besides it’ll be a lot to explain if the younger version of River had seen her older self, right Doctor?” Yaz decided she never wanted to meet any other versions of herself at any point in her life, especially not pre-Doctor but absolutely not post-Doctor - a time which she found herself increasingly contemplating.

But River was probably a different matter, holding time in her hands as she does. Yaz had a tiny taste of their intersecting, out-of-time lives when the Doctor had taken them all on one last mission to complete the time loop of their latest adventure: to drop off the note that the Doctor (or was it Joan?) had written for a younger River at Luna University.

River had joined them while they explored the wonderful university on the moon in the 52nd Century, holding fervent conversations with fellow faculty passing in the halls and students who clambered in awe after her advice. The Doctor, too, ended up being distracted showcasing different spots around the campus where she had spent time with River. So distracted, in fact, that they left little time to get on with the actual task they had traveled there to complete and were almost caught by a younger River, with poor straggling Graham bumping into her right outside her office door where she demanded to know what he wanted. The younger River was all sharp edges from the outside, if Yaz didn’t know any better.

“Normally I would be worried about paradoxes,” The Doctor said, face drawn like she was going to give a lecture, but amusement shone through her features as she considered her wife. “This sort of thing just doesn’t seem to stick to River, eh. There were two versions of her in the TARDIS one time. That was a busy day!”

“Busy, indeed. Imagine!” River shot the Doctor a wicked look.

“In - in different rooms!” The Doctor sputtered, “You kept turning up without warning. And asking me who I was talking to.”

Even Yaz felt her cheeks warm. She looked between the Doctor and River, who were sitting in separate chairs but had their bodies tilted toward one another. “Is it always like this for you?”

“Timey-wimey,” the Doctor declared, as if that explained anything at all.

“We have our moments. The Doctor likes to show up whenever I’m busiest at the university,” River gave the Doctor a sidelong glance while the Doctor shrugged as if to say ‘not me’. “But that always got me out of the mind-numbing exercise of marking essays. Plus she does have a time machine…though you don’t always drop me off on time.” She directed this last bit at her wife, who shrugged again.

“What can I say? TARDIS loves having you around.”

Ryan choked on his biscuit - and his sarcasm, laughing. “Yeah, mate, the TARDIS.” Yaz laughed too.

“She does!” The Doctor protested, though her eyes were bright with affection. Before meeting River, Yaz had never thought she would see the Doctor so taken with someone else, so transfixed. The Doctor who was in love with the universe and could never stop long enough in one place.

River seemed similarly enthralled, not only relishing running around with the Doctor but also enjoying this little slice of domesticity with her friends. It was easy to get swept up in her attention - their attention - when they stopped on you. River turned to Graham. “No wonder you looked so familiar when I first saw you here. You were the strange guy standing outside my office.”

“My days of getting burnt by the espresso machine are behind me, thank heavens,” Graham remarked, looking over at the coffee shop counter where a new barista stood as if he was having war flashbacks.

They had agreed to meet in the coffee shop one final time, after Yaz, Graham and Ryan wrapped up the lives they were about to leave behind - the niggly human details of quitting jobs and ending leases. The last thing they needed was missing people notices taken out on them in the country.

It felt sort of familiar by now, bantering with the Doctor’s wife and lounging at a coffee shop together - an odd, comforting blend of impossible and ordinary. But a sense of goodbye hung in the air between them all, pressing more heavily by the minute.

Yaz had thought she would be immensely glad this little interlude was over, and she was, thrilled to get back to the TARDIS again, but she found she was missing her time with Joan already: their lowkey meals, coming home to a building that also housed the Doctor and having a companionship with her that felt unburdened, free.

Right about then a young man in a black oversized hoodie and a significant amount of gel in his hair rocked up to their little corner in the coffee shop. “Doctor Smith!” He exclaimed. “What are you wearing?”

Far from taking it as an insult, the Doctor was gleeful. “Alex!” She greeted enthusiastically, “Isn’t my coat cool?”

“Yes?” Alex answered, looking about the rest of them curiously.

The Doctor jumped up happily to do the introductions. “Fam, this is Alex, a student at the uni. Alex, my fam - Yaz, Graham, and Ryan-” Alex mouthed ‘Fam?’ in disbelief to himself, “-and this is my wife Professor River Song.”

“Wife?” Alex said it this time out loud. “I didn’t know you had a wife, Doctor Smith.” He gave her an impressed look. “Aw, damn, Doctor Smith pulls!”

“What am I pulling?” The Doctor asked, wrinkling her nose in confusion. Yaz and Ryan glanced at each other, Ryan looking like he wanted to drown in his mug.

“Nice to meet you all,” Alex said, in amusement, “We heard you’re leaving us, Doctor Smith. It’s so sudden. Where are you going to go?”

The Doctor too had resigned from the London School of Art, History and Culture - though only at their insistence, muttering something incomprehensible about still having a faculty position somewhere in Bristol after 70 years.

“Figured I’ll do a spot of travelling,” she smiled sincerely at him, before raising her eyebrows conspiratorially at Yaz. River was rolling her eyes fondly.

“Right on. That sounds proper awesome,” said Alex. “Well, you’re a little weird but we will miss you.”

The Doctor beamed. “Thank you, Alex. I’ll miss you all too. Miss this.”

After Alex turned to leave, the Doctor’s grin dipped slightly and turned a little sorrowful, not bothering to hide for once. But before Yaz could examine it properly, the Doctor clapped her hands together and said, “Shall we?”

“Let’s go,” Graham agreed, flashing the Doctor a genial, understanding look. Ryan and Yaz nodded in turn. Yaz tried her best to telegraph excitement, to nudge the Doctor towards it. River, too, was smiling when she assented, an old, kind smile that reminded Yaz of the Doctor.

As they shuffled out of their seats and exited the coffee shop for the last time, the Doctor turned to River outside the door.

“Drop you off?” She asked, casual, gentle, almost afraid. The TARDIS stood at the corner of an alley, just a few steps away, solid and inviting.

River gave her a soft quirk of the mouth. “Yes, please, a few days after you left the note would be ideal.” She could not keep out a layer of finality in her voice. But then she talked of a beginning. “It was here when I first knocked that coffee into you. Wasn’t that fun?”

The Doctor rocked back and forth on her heels, hands clasped in front of her. “Yeah, it was.” Her face was inclined toward River, obscured from the rest by her hair.

It was all quite wretched, these two women who must have said goodbye a thousand times before and yet still not quite knowing how, Yaz thought as she watched helplessly, before feeling Ryan pull her away by the shoulders. She followed him and Graham into the waiting TARDIS, and soon River and the Doctor joined them at the console.

The Doctor started pulling on levers and turning knobs silently, expertly but without flourish, her coat flying behind her as she moved around the crystal column. River was standing with the rest above the metal grate, and Yaz was finding it was not only the Doctor who was reluctant to see her go.

“Thank you for everything, River,” Graham was the first as usual to be able to approach something difficult simply because it was the right thing to do. “We never could have helped the Doctor through this without you.”

“Yeah, you saved the Doctor, and us, really,” Yaz said, meaning it. “Thank you.”

“Oh, all in a day’s work,” River could have seemed dismissive to anyone else but Yaz caught something reaching out from the depths of her eyes, something resembling gratitude. “It was very nice to meet all of you indeed.”

She looked for something in the khaki pants she was now sporting, pulling out the sonic trowel and laying it out casually in front of Ryan. “Here, have this, as a parting gift.”

Ryan’s eyes widened. “For me?”

“You use it with such flair, and besides you’ll probably need it for the next time the Doctor gets in trouble again.”

Ryan looked overwhelmed, like he did not know what to think, and he cast a glance over at the Doctor who was now leaning on the console and watching them in amusement. “Go on, then,” she said.

“Oh, thank you so much!” Ryan accepted the trowel in his hand and started pointing it at random directions.

“Oi, not in here please!” The Doctor exclaimed.

Ryan stopped but his glee could not be contained, though he tried for serious sincerity when he said, “It has been a pleasure, Professor River Song.”

“Pleasure’s all mine,” River’s voice was smooth and light.

The TARDIS started to make its dematerialising noise, a sound that seemed to announce this was it, here they were - time running out in front of them. Yaz, Graham and Ryan looked plaintively at one another and started backing away, at the same time that the Doctor launched herself off the console and stood in front of her wife in one quick motion. They were framed by the double doors of the TARDIS, artificial light from Luna University shining through from outside.

“Shall we visit Jim the Fish the next time? See how he’s going with that dam?” The smile on the Doctor’s face didn’t quite dare to spill into joy.

River pulled the Doctor in by her yellow braces, which the Doctor allowed quite happily. “How about Darillum? You’ve promised to bring me to the Singing Towers for years now!”

Several different emotions seemed to flit across the Doctor’s face at once, somehow both transparent and inscrutable. She held River in her arms like she was touching time itself, and finally she settled on a tenderness that made Yaz’s breath catch in her throat. “A promise that I fully intend to keep. We’ll have the most brilliant, beautiful time. Just watch us.”

“I’ll see you again?” River sounded tremendously, tremulously young in that moment, so full of wanting.

“You’ll see me again,” the Doctor breathed out, all love, no regret.

“Until the next time, Doctor.”

“Until next time, sweetie.”

Yaz was struck by the profound intimacy of the farewell between the Doctor and River, simultaneously aggrieved and glad to witness it - be a part of it - and then horrified at herself for being glad. She closed her eyes as if to guard against the utter devastation that threatened to break the surface but was only kept at bay by both their sheer desire to spare the other.

When she opened her eyes again, the Doctor was alone.

—-

Hours later when Yaz emerged from the depths of the TARDIS, she found the Doctor sitting at the edge of the entrance, boot-clad legs hanging out the open door, eyes ahead of her on a hazy swirl of lights and planets that seemed immobile, blue and silver and white, yet containing multitudes all pulled together.

“That’s the Milky Way, innit?” Yaz came up behind the Doctor.

“That’s right, gold star for you Yasmin Khan,” the Doctor said without looking at her, as if Yaz had been there all along.

River would be somewhere in there, on the lone moon orbiting a blue planet. And so was Yaz’s family, Ryan’s dad, his friends, Graham’s friends, some of the Doctor’s friends maybe, everyone Yaz ever knew and ever loved, well, except for one person sitting right here.

“It’s amazin’,” Yaz said, her voice just above a whisper, as if afraid to disturb the beauty.

“It is, isn’t it?” The Doctor said. Yaz wondered if she was thinking about the people she loved too.

She crouched down to take a seat next to the Doctor, crossing her legs as the Doctor shifted to give her space, flashing her a smile - not quite the high wattage version she wore on adventures but also not the false, empty replica the Doctor thought they could not notice was different. It was a pensive sort of look, more a question than an answer. And, as always, Yaz took what she could get.

“How are you feeling, Doctor?”

“I’m all right, Yaz.” Somehow, Yaz believed her.

“Was that the last time you’ll see River?” Once the question stole out of her, she worried instantly that it was cruel.

But the Doctor’s smile only turned resigned. “Most likely - I think so. Probably.” She considered the Milky Way, perhaps looking for the earth’s moon. “It won’t be her last time though, and the next time she sees me we’ll finally stay in the same place for a long time. She will finally believe it, I think.”

“Believe what?”

“That I love her,” the Doctor said this so softly - directed to the galaxy - Yaz almost wondered if she imagined it.

How could she not know, Yaz wanted to say. How could she miss the Doctor hanging on her every word, enthralled by her every move? But then Yaz thought about the Doctor’s long life - lives even - with companion after companion and her never staying still, and she recognised how River might not know. The Doctor seemed to always slip through her grasp, but at this moment she has never felt more solid. It felt like a closing window. Yaz took a chance.

“Was she the only one you loved?” Yaz asked, in a fit of nerve, but managing to sound even.

The Doctor’s gaze returned to Yaz with the force of a galaxy. She was searching Yaz’s face like when they were in that warehouse on Antara IV; Yaz felt her heart thundering uselessly in her chest. “I loved them all.” Who were they, Yaz wanted to ask, but then- “Even you, Yaz.”

Yaz feared if she moved she might shatter like glass, or her runaway heart might break her from the inside. It seemed impossible, and yet the Doctor was here, right here, she was still, and she was open.

“I- Do you mean-” Yaz tried, “I mean - you-” Amusement stretched the Doctor’s smile larger over her face, as she waited pointedly for Yaz to recover. “Do you- do you love me the way you love Ryan and Graham?” Even saying it out loud made Yaz want to take in several deep breaths at once.

“No,” the Doctor said. So much contained in a word. And that was it, really.

Yaz plucked up all the threads of courage that wove through her - some laid down by the Doctor herself, but many that were knitted into her from way before - and threw herself forward to kiss the Doctor before she could think better of it. The Doctor made a surprised noise but then - kissed Yaz back, gentle and chaste.

In that moment it was Yaz who held time in her hands.

Later, Graham and Ryan came into the console room to find a cheery Doctor who was chattering away about yet another factoid of another planet in another time, and a perfectly, incandescently happy Yaz who was listening.

The Doctor shot them both warm smiles when they arrived. “It’s time for the next stop! Any ideas, fam? Ooh, after months of cold English weather it might be good to see some sun - how about the oldest beach in the universe? Oh! Or how about a planet made entirely out of metallic trees designed to power the whole ecosystem? Speaking of trees, Ursulonamex! You can even live in some of the larger trees!”

The three of them watched as the Doctor prattled on, and Yaz knew that, like her, Ryan and Graham were feeling like coming home.

“Hang on a moment, Doc, these places - have you been there before? With your other friends, earlier?” Graham asked.

The Doctor blinked at the question, not expecting it, but then understood quickly that she probably should have, a long time ago even. “Some of them, and others are completely new, to me as well.”

“Will you tell us about them one day? Your friends? The full stories of your dreams as Joan?”

For a moment, the Doctor was silent and Yaz’s mind raced. Perhaps they’ve finally taken it too far. They’ve asked too much of her. This was the Doctor, not Joan. Then the Doctor’s face broke open into a smile, ancient and warm, and she answered, “One day.”

Graham smiled too and Ryan agreed, “One day.”

“Right then,” the Doctor said, one hand on the lever, eyes on her team, her friends, and her smile a promise. “Where to, next?”

.

.

.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it, folks. What else can I say but a huge, hearty thank you from the bottom of my heart(s) for making it this far with me. Thank you to everyone who has read, left kudos, taken the time to write comments, and for engaging with this story. You've been utterly brilliant. 
> 
> This story took me entirely by surprise, and I've learnt so much along the way - about writing, about these amazing characters, and about this wonderful fandom. This is by no means a perfect story - there are still some bits I would like to go back and edit - but I'm so glad for sticking it out to the end. One final note on the story: fully understand that setting this story before River's time with Twelve on Darillium might complicate River's assumption that she's seen all of the Doctor's faces but let's just assume she's somehow added Thirteen into that list. 
> 
> I fully believe fanfiction is an extension of an ongoing conversation between fans and in relation to art. Thank you for having that conversation with me. I'm not sure if I will write more fic. This pairing has so much going for it and I love Thirteen an awful amount. I have a couple of different ideas, but I don't know if I will pursue them yet. But if you'll like to continue chatting with me about all things DW or anything at all, you can find me at finefrenzy-.tumblr.com
> 
> Cheers all, and until next time.


End file.
